Oral Answers to Questions

WORK AND PENSIONS

The Secretary of State was asked—

Pensioners

Teddy Taylor: What estimate he has made of the number of retirement pensioners in the forthcoming year; and how many there were five years ago.

Andrew Smith: It is fitting that the hon. Gentleman is No. 1 in questions today, as I understand that last week he announced his prospective retirement from the House. I am sure that I speak on behalf of the whole House in paying tribute to his years of distinguished service and in wishing him all the very best for the future.
	The number of people over state pension age in Great Britain is estimated to be 10.85 million, compared with 10.47 million five years ago. In the course of this year we expect 113,500 additional people to be above state pension age. Since we took office the number of pensioners has gone up by 4 per cent. The real value of spending on pensions and benefits for people over 60 has gone up by 24 per cent.

Teddy Taylor: I thank the Secretary of State for his kind words, which I genuinely very much appreciate, but is he aware of the concern and alarm among 10 million pensioners about the pressure being put on them to give up their pension book and to use bank accounts instead, in anticipation of the abolition of pension books in 2005? Would he be willing to discuss with his Cabinet colleagues the fact that many pensioners enjoy having a pension book and are concerned about the linked effect, which will result in the closure of a huge number of post offices on which pensioners depend greatly for many services? I thank the Secretary of State for all that he has done, but will he discuss the issue with colleagues as it is genuinely serious and will affect a lot of elderly people—like me?

Andrew Smith: I certainly recognise the concerns of the hon. Gentleman and of those who have raised the matter with him. We should remember that the majority of pensioners choose to have their payments made directly. Moreover, the order book is vulnerable to fraud and theft; many pensioners are attacked and their order book stolen from them. We are honouring our pledge that pensioners will be able to continue to receive their pension in cash at the post office. An exceptions service will be in place for those for whom the Post Office card account is not suitable, to ensure that their needs are met.

Lindsay Hoyle: Is my right hon. Friend aware of the growth in the number not only of pensioners but also of people who are penalised by the transport lottery—the postcode lottery whereby some pensioners have free off-peak travel while others do not? What can be done to ensure that all pensioners are treated the same? Can they have better help through the pension system?

Andrew Smith: To the best of my knowledge, there is a national commitment to a concessionary scheme. I admit that that will mean that some local authorities will provide help over and above the national minimum, but there is always tension between the responsiveness and democratic accountability that we want in localities and the avoidance of a postcode lottery. However, the enormous investment that we are making in our public transport system is a certain factor in ensuring that transport is available in rural as well as in urban areas to meet the needs of pensioners as well as others.

Andrew Selous: May I press the Secretary of State further on the question about pension books asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Rochford and Southend, East (Sir Teddy Taylor)? Will the right hon. Gentleman say a little more about the concerns of pensioners who have several carers? When their pension books go, there may be problems with the PINs if several carers are involved.

Andrew Smith: As the hon. Gentleman will be aware, we have ensured that pensioners can nominate somebody to use a card on their behalf to collect their pension. Where they need to make arrangements involving a number of people, they can do so at present through the order book, but we shall have to ensure that the exceptions service also enables them to meet that need.

Brian Jenkins: My right hon. Friend is perfectly aware of the fact that to use a book in a post office requires a post office, and that plans for the urban reconstruction—or destruction—of post offices in my part of the world mean that no post offices or cash outlets will be available. Pensioners could use a free bus pass if the proposed buses were actually on a bus route, but they are not even on a bus route. How will he get the money to those people?

Andrew Smith: As I am sure my hon. Friend will recognise, we have put £2 billion into supporting the post office network, including more than £400 million in rural areas. It makes sense to plan locally to ensure better co-ordination between accessibility, which includes his point about public transport routes, and the availability of points where pensioners can collect their cash, whether at the post office or through alternative facilities.

Defined Benefit Pension Schemes

Vincent Cable: What estimate he has made of the number of wind-ups of defined benefit pension schemes in solvent companies in 2003.

Malcolm Wicks: The pension schemes registry holds information on the number of final salary schemes that are currently winding up, or which have entered into and completed the winding-up process. It is not, however, designed or intended to provide a comprehensive or continuous statistical record of the status of schemes, and it does not provide information on the solvency position of companies whose schemes are winding up.
	According to the registry, in the first half of 2003 approximately 100 of a total of some 15,000 defined benefit pension schemes had started the winding-up process, and approximately 260 such schemes had finished winding up. Owing to schemes having a 12-month notification period, these figures may be subject to change.

Vincent Cable: I thank the Minister for that informative reply. Is he aware of the recent warning from the Office of the Pensions Advisory Service that a massive loophole is opening up in the Government's pension protection plans, inasmuch as solvent companies with large deficits in their pension schemes on a minimum funding requirement basis can capitalise on those deficits, and then renege on their debts at the expense of their pensioners? Does he recognise OPAS's warning that there could be what it calls
	"a flood of solvent wind-ups before April 2005 at members' expense",
	and how would he plug that loophole?

Malcolm Wicks: All our endeavours—including the pensions Bill, which will be published soon—are intended to get security back into social security in old age. We will listen very carefully to any concerns about loopholes, including those expressed by OPAS, in order to ensure that there are not ways in which people can avoid their responsibilities.

Frank Field: In the past four months, when asked when the House will see the pensions Bill, the Minister for Pensions has said—as he said this afternoon—that it will appear "soon". How soon is "soon", and when "soon" arrives will the Bill contain a clause that puts a levy on unclaimed assets, so that people who have already lost most of, if not all, their pension will be compensated at least to some extent?

Malcolm Wicks: I like to be consistent, but may I now revise "soon" to "very soon"? My right hon. Friend, who is occasionally a patient man, will not have to wait very much longer. The pensions Bill will be concerned with establishing a new pension protection fund and a new regulator with real teeth, to ensure that when pension promises are made, they are kept.

Michael Weir: Is the Minister aware of the research of Dr. Ros Altmann, who calculates that some 40,000 members of pension schemes are affected by these wind-ups, and that some £93 million will be needed to compensate them over many years? If he is not, will he look at that research and think again about compensation for those who have already lost out, because as I understand it the forthcoming Bill will not deal with retrospective claims?

Malcolm Wicks: Various matters are on the agenda. We are concerned that solvent companies that seek to wind up their schemes must now guarantee the full buy-out of pension rights for members. Secondly, the "pensions (very soon) Bill" will legislate for a pension protection fund to bring future security. Meanwhile, we are looking at the very serious circumstances that existing pensioners and members face in respect of schemes that have gone bankrupt, but it is important to repeat that we cannot provide any false hope in what is a very complex situation.

John McFall: The Minister will know that some companies are using the flight from such schemes to reduce their contributions to employees, and that there is a long-term saving problem in this country. What are the Government doing to ensure that these employers face up to their responsibilities to employees in future?

Malcolm Wicks: It is very important that employers are able to offer proper company pension schemes. We have created an employers taskforce to look at this issue, and its purpose is to establish good practice. We are very conscious of the need for many people to save more than they are saving at the moment. Our recent strategy paper on informed choice is designed to introduce measures that will enable people to make better choices. In other ways, too, we are concerned to enable people to save more and to have decent pension schemes.

Nigel Waterson: Has the Minister seen last week's calculation by Mercer that the total deficit in UK occupational pensions is now £330 billion? Does he agree that EU rules requiring companies to make up that deficit may render irrelevant much of the pensions Bill, even before it is published?

Malcolm Wicks: I certainly do not recognise the hon. Gentleman's last point. We have consulted on the EU directive, which is very much in line with our own ideas. The pensions Bill will promote the concept of scheme-specific funding, which the industry has widely welcomed. Estimates of pension liabilities vary a great deal. Other estimates suggest that recent increases in world share prices have made the deficit less than it was, but none of us is complacent about the issue.

New Deal

Claire Ward: If he will make a statement on the impact of the new deal for lone parents.

Des Browne: The new deal for lone parents is just one of a raft of measures that we have introduced to help lone parents gain independence through work. Other measures include our national child care strategy; the lone parent's benefit run-on; and the working tax credit, including the child tax credit. By the end of September 2003, more than 430,000 lone parents had participated in the new deal for lone parents and more than 220,000 had been helped into work. There is still more to do, but we have made major progress towards meeting our target of getting 70 per cent. of lone parents into work.

Claire Ward: I thank my hon. Friend for his reply and for the impact that the new deal has made on lone parents. Has he seen recent research showing that the costs of child care are rising rapidly in the private sector and making it increasingly difficult for lone parents as well as two-parent families to secure work or be able to return to work and pay for child care provision? What discussions has my hon. Friend had with colleagues in other Departments about making child care affordable for lone parents as well as for two-parent families?

Des Browne: My hon. Friend is right to highlight the role of good-quality, affordable child care in helping to secure a route out of poverty for families. Constant discussion takes place between officials and Ministers in my Department and those in the Department for Education and Skills and the Treasury. My hon. Friend will be aware of the announcements in the pre-Budget statement on making child care affordable, and she should be reassured that the Government are on track to meet their target on the roll-out of the national child care strategy. Indeed, there are currently more than 800,000 new child care places in the UK, from which 1.4 million children benefit.

George Osborne: Will the Minister confirm whether, when a lone parent leaves—or is sacked from—a job after 14 weeks, the Government chalk it up as a success for the new deal in getting people into sustained employment?

Des Browne: The measures in place for measuring whether jobs are retained are fully in the public domain. The hon. Gentleman gleans his information in that way, but I have to say that it would be a sad day when the Government took advice from a party that, when in government, as the hon. Member for Havant (Mr. Willetts) admitted, waged war on lone parents. We will take no advice from such a party on how we should conduct our policy on lone parents. The fact remains that, although the measurement is in the public domain, there is clear evidence to suggest that significant numbers of people who benefit from the new deal or the new deal for lone parents move on later into long-term and sustained work. That is why we can now celebrate the fact that about 500,000 children have been taken out of poverty in the UK.

Louise Ellman: What improvements does my hon. Friend intend to make to the new deal for lone parents, and what assessment has he made of the impact of abandoning the programme?

Des Browne: My hon. Friend is right to highlight the fact that not all parties in the House support the measures in place in labour market programmes, which have resulted in 1.7 million more people across the board in work today than in 1997, and 500,000 fewer people on unemployment benefit. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, my other ministerial colleagues and I are hell-bent on improving the labour market programmes and building further on them. My hon. Friend will be aware of the roll-out of work-focused interviews for lone parents, which provides them with an opportunity to find out what employment can do for them and their families to lift their children out of poverty. We move forward with that programme.

Occupational Pensions

Kevin Brennan: What plans he has to permit employers to compel employees to join final salary occupational pension schemes.

Andrew Smith: The Government have no such plans. The independent Pensions Commission is examining whether greater compulsion is advisable. As we set out last week, we are looking at whether it makes sense to promote more general use of schemes that automatically enrol employees unless they chose to opt out and at how we can best ensure that an individual's decision to join or not to join an occupational pension is based on good information.

Kevin Brennan: I thank the Secretary of State for that answer. When my father joined the steel industry, he was compelled to join a final salary occupational scheme and, fortunately, that has seen him well in retirement. The Allied Steel and Wire workers were similarly compelled to join an occupational pension scheme. When people ask me, "Would you let what has happened to the ASW workers happen to your own father?" my answer is an unequivocal no. What would the Secretary of State's answer be to the same question?

Andrew Smith: I would share my hon. Friend's concern for the plight of those affected, as the Minister for Pensions, other ministerial colleagues and I have made clear on many occasions. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend's energy and commitment in campaigning on behalf of those who have lost out because of company insolvency. As he knows, we have been examining whether anything might be done, without wanting to raise false hope, and as soon as I am able to report further to the House I will do so.

Derek Wyatt: As the Secretary of State knows, I am interested in ASW—ASW Sheerness is in my constituency—along with my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, West (Kevin Brennan) and the hon. Member for Twickenham (Dr. Cable), who asked a question that was similar to questions that we have been asking in the House for the past couple of months: how do we get to the bottom of how many people's pension schemes are in deficit? If my right hon. Friend introduces a retrospective measure—we hope that he will—how will he know that it will cover everyone if there are differences of opinion between the Treasury, the Office of the Pensions Advisory Service and other groups?

Andrew Smith: As my hon. Friend suggests, identifying precisely who has lost out in that way is one of the many dimensions of difficulty to this very challenging issue. As I said when he last raised this, other issues include how to differentiate between some who have lost out and others who have lost out in respect of eligibility; whether it is right to use taxpayers' money—let us remember that half of taxpayers are not members of occupational pensions schemes—to give extra help to that group; the risk of raising expectations that taxpayers stand behind private savings and pensions as a whole; and, not least, the risk of prejudicing the legal action that has been taken already. I mention those matters to show that we are carefully looking at the issue—including, as my hon. Friend points out, at the numbers affected—but I am not able today to say what the conclusion of that examination is.

Antisocial Behaviour

Desmond Swayne: What his policy is on the use of access to means-tested benefits as a deterrent to antisocial behaviour.

Chris Pond: As a matter of principle, we do not believe that the community has an unconditional responsibility to support those who do not fulfil their responsibilities to the community. We have introduced a range of tough penalties to deal with antisocial behaviour, which blights people's daily lives, including measures in the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003, which came into force that month. Following consultation, I recently announced that we will not go ahead with a housing benefit sanction at this stage, but we do not rule out introducing further measures when we have seen how effective the range of measures already in place has been.

Desmond Swayne: That was most disappointing. The painfully slow pace at which the Government have been tiptoeing in the right direction has been frustrating. The Prime Minister pledged himself to that policy on 1 May last year, and the Government are now backing off. May we have an explanation?

Chris Pond: We will take every practical measure necessary to deal with antisocial behaviour. [Interruption]. I wish that we could count on the support of the Opposition in that determination to deal with antisocial and loutish behaviour. I have reminded the House that in recent weeks we have introduced a number of new measures that are intended to deal with antisocial behaviour. The hon. Gentleman will be aware that we are extending the pilot schemes to sanction offenders who breach their community sentences. We will watch closely to see what effect those measures have, but if they do not have the effect of dealing significantly with antisocial behaviour we will not hesitate to look again at sanctions on housing benefit.

Vera Baird: The problem with benefit sanctions is that they can punish entire families when only one member may not be acting responsibly. Antisocial behaviour is a dreadful problem, not least in Redcar where almost every surgery I hold brings a new complaint. Will the Minister look with great care at schemes run and supported by organisations such as Shelter in Rochdale and Bolton, among other places, that aim to change the behaviour of problem members of families? They are not at all softie stuff, so will he examine those schemes with care before he looks again at benefit sanctions?

Chris Pond: I thank my hon. and learned Friend for those comments. We must, of course, use the full range of measures. Some of them will be positive; some of them will be negative such as sanctions. For example, in community sentences, we are balancing both the piloting of the sanctions with incentives for those who do not breach their community service orders. However, we must be aware that the community and all our constituents want to see us acting decisively using every practical measure that is available. Sanctions have been built into the social security system since 1911, when unemployment benefit was first introduced, for reasons that are still relevant today.

David Willetts: Will the Minister confirm whether the Prime Minister was informed and consulted before last week's announcement to abandon housing benefit sanctions?

Chris Pond: I think that you, Mr. Speaker, can be sure that the Prime Minister was fully aware of the decision. From the answer that he gave at Prime Minister's Question Time, it was very clear that he was aware of the decision.

David Willetts: I am pleased to hear that the Prime Minister was consulted, but when my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the Opposition asked him about the subject last Wednesday I did not gain the impression that the Prime Minister was fully aware of it. Therefore, I am very pleased to hear that he was consulted. It was put to him that he had specifically made a pledge in his 2002 conference speech that he would implement the measure, so what was his reaction when the Minister told him that he was abandoning the idea?

Chris Pond: If I remember rightly, the Prime Minister was very grateful to the Leader of the Opposition for reminding him of his conference speeches. The Prime Minister also reminded the Leader of the Opposition, who had forgotten within a matter of days, that only very recently we introduced a full range of measures and brought them into force to deal with antisocial behaviour. We have made it absolutely clear that we will see how effective those measures are. If we need to use other measures, we will not hesitate to do so.

Pensioner Incomes

John MacDougall: What assessment he has made of the effect of Government policy on the incomes of (a) the poorest pensioners and (b) all pensioners.

Andrew Smith: As a result of Government measures since 1997, including the introduction of pension credit, pensioner households are now, on average, £24 a week better off in real terms. The poorest third of pensioner households are £30 a week better off. I have today placed in the Library the latest figures for take-up of pension credit at a national and constituency level. They show that 2.18 million households, and 2.62 million individuals, are now in receipt of pension credit.

John MacDougall: I thank the Secretary of State for that response. Does he agree that, after many years of missed opportunities to redress the imbalance in terms of pensioners and their requirements, the introduction of the pension credit scheme is very welcome? For example, in my constituency of Central Fife, 3,091 pensioner households benefit on average by £39.36 a week, and I am sure that they appreciate that. The policy must be very welcome.

Andrew Smith: I thank my hon. Friend for his welcome for the progress that we are making on pension credit in his constituency and throughout the country. Much hard work is going in not only on the telephone lines, but on the 302,000 home visits that the Pension Service has made across the country. That reflects great credit on all the staff who are working to make a success of this important policy of countering pensioner poverty and rewarding pensioners with modest savings.

Steve Webb: The Secretary of State knows that on average the oldest pensioners tend to be the poorest pensioners. He also knows that his Department's statistics show that older pensioners are the least likely to claim his pension credit. The Government are right to target the winter fuel payment by giving extra money to older pensioners, and they are right to target free TV licences by giving them only to older pensioners. Why will he not be right again by targeting the basic state pension in the same way?

Andrew Smith: The hon. Gentleman acknowledges that a lot more is right with our policies than is wrong. I remember his conceding in a previous exchange that if we were to follow his advice it would mean giving less to poorer, younger pensioners in order to give more to better-off, older pensioners. It makes sense to combine universal entitlements with help especially targeted at the poorest in the pensions system. Thanks to those policies, we have helped 1.6 million pensioners out of absolute poverty and 400,000 pensioners out of relative poverty. We shall keep driving those policies forward to make a success of the war against poverty.

Stephen Hepburn: Can the Secretary of State explain why only half of the 5 million pensioners who are eligible for pension credit claim it? What is he going to do about that?

Andrew Smith: We are, of course, only part of the way through the campaign period to ensure maximum take-up of pension credit. We said that we would write to every pensioner household in the country by June. I am confident that we will achieve that target, and I hope that we will write to every pensioner household before then. I have already referred to the extensive outreach work, which includes more than 300,000 home visits, and there is also TV advertising, press advertising and word of mouth among pensioners, which is increasingly important. Pensioners commend the friendliness and responsiveness of the service, which is a point borne out by independent research.
	Returning to older pensioners, as we try—as we must—to drive take-up higher, it is all the more important to work intensively in collaboration with social services and others to identify those older and frail pensioners who are least likely to claim and ensure that they do so.

Patrick McLoughlin: Since 1997, has the number of pensioners on means-tested benefits gone up or down?

Andrew Smith: Conservative Members keep dragging out the question of means-tested benefits. I am proud that so many more pensioners benefit from the pension credit than gained from the minimum income arrangements under the previous Government. Let us remember that poorer pensioners are getting substantially more than they were in 1997. The £30 more a week enables this Government to make progress in combating pensioner poverty that could only have been dreamt about when the Conservative party froze the real value of the pension year in, year out. The Conservative Government increased it only when they introduced VAT on fuel, which placed so many pensioners in poverty.

Richard Burden: May I add my welcome for the pension credit's impact on both poorer pensioners and those with small occupational pensions? Does the Secretary of State agree that pensions policies must mesh with our policies on occupational pensions if we are to get them right? Although the pensions Bill will certainly help, may I again draw his attention to the important point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, West (Kevin Brennan) about the need to tackle those pensioners who have lost through the failure of occupational pensions, which include not only ASW but firms such as Kalamazoo in my constituency?

Andrew Smith: I acknowledge my hon. Friend's important points about his constituents at Kalamazoo and the success of pension credit. The imminent pensions Bill—we are that much closer to it now my right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field) has spoken—will set up a pension protection fund, which will ensure that in future a pensions promise made will be a pensions promise honoured.

Pension Credit

John Barrett: How many pensioner households in Scotland are in receipt of pension credit.

Malcolm Wicks: I am pleased to report that so far, as at 31 January, there were 229,000 households in Scotland, comprising approximately 271,000 individuals, receiving pension credit. We have today published the latest monthly pension credit progress report, including numbers of recipient households in each parliamentary constituency in Great Britain. The hon. Gentleman will be interested to learn that more than 2,000 households now receive pension credit in his constituency, 73 per cent. of which are financial gainers as a result.

John Barrett: Still only some 50 per cent. of those who are entitled to pension credit have taken it up. What consideration has been given to whether the application process puts people off applying for the pension credit? One constituent wrote to me saying that after answering the questions on the form they felt stripped of all dignity and decided not to bother in the end. What can be done to ensure that those who need and deserve the credit can get through the application system?

Malcolm Wicks: I am sorry about the tone that the hon. Gentleman has adopted. It would have been foolish to try to write to 7 million or more pensioner households across Britain in one week or one month. That is why we have a phased take-up programme. In that way, we can answer the phone calls—we answer 96 per cent. within 30 seconds—and anyone who applies up to October this year will have any credit entitlement backdated to October last year. I am pleased to note that one of the hon. Gentleman's colleagues, the hon. Member for Gordon (Malcolm Bruce), said:
	"I am delighted to see Aberdeenshire pensioners gaining significantly by the introduction of the new Pension Credit."
	It is good to see that not all Liberal Democrats are trying to put elderly people off the pension credit.

Bill Tynan: The 3,000-plus pensioner households in Hamilton, South are obviously delighted with the average payment of £45 that they are getting through pension credit. Phasing in was vital, and should continue, but does my hon. Friend accept that overpayment because of miscalculation could be a problem in some instances? Will he consider such problems sympathetically, if they occur?

Malcolm Wicks: I am happy to talk to my hon. Friend about any particular problems in his constituency. I doubt that overpayment would occur in many circumstances. While some people bandy around the words "means test", let us remember that under the previous Government there was a weekly means test. Pension credit is a million miles away from that, because we do not seek information about people's finances once a credit has been made.

Alistair Carmichael: What steps he is taking to encourage pension credit take-up.

Maria Eagle: We are currently in the main phase of our marketing campaign for pension credit and have carried out TV and press advertising as well as writing directly to pensioner households. We are working in partnership with organisations such as Help the Aged, Age Concern and the National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux at a national and local level to ensure that as many pensioners as possible take up their entitlement.

Alistair Carmichael: I thank the Minister for that answer. However, in my constituency, fewer people receive money through the pension credit than under the minimum income guarantee. As for the letter-writing campaign, is the Minister aware that some 72,000 pensioners entitled to pension credit will die before the Government get round to telling them about it? Those figures are from the Library. How bad do things have to be before the Government admit that their scheme is failing?

Maria Eagle: I am surprised to hear the tone of the hon. Gentleman's remarks, given that he has assisted us greatly in his constituency with enabling his constituents to claim. I take issue with his first point: my figures indicate that the number of people claiming pension credit in his constituency has increased by 25 per cent. over the number claiming the minimum income guarantee. Perhaps I could sit down with the hon. Gentleman outside the Chamber to try to work out how he has received that impression. I do not think that what he said is correct. He has a large rural constituency and that poses particular problems in ensuring that everybody gets their entitlements. However, he and others have helped us to increase the number of people claiming. For example, the Women's Royal Voluntary Service in Shetland contacted us about one lady. As a result of a home visit, she ended up with an extra £124 a week, in attendance allowance and pension credit. That has got to be worth the effort that he and our local staff are putting in.

Helen Jackson: Has my hon. Friend had time to look at the research produced by the Fawcett Society last week, which shows that one in four single women pensioners are still living in poverty? What steps will she take to use the pension credit system to address that problem? It stems partly from the broken working periods that make up most women's working lives, meaning that they enter the pensioner stage at a huge disadvantage to men.

Maria Eagle: I acknowledge that issue, but I can tell my hon. Friend that pension credit is a way of targeting money at those at the poorest end. Almost 60 per cent. of the extra £2 billion spend on pension credit each year goes to the poorest third of pensioners, most of whom are women. She should do what I am urging others to do: get pensioners to claim. I know that there are 4,310 households in her constituency now claiming pension credit, with an average weekly award of £37.68, which is well worth it for those individuals.

Paul Goodman: The Government want at least 3 million pensioner households to take up pension credit by 2006, but on the Government's figures, even if that target is reached, 1.4 million of the poorest pensioners will not be taking up the pension credit. Is it not therefore evident that the Government's obsession with means-testing will leave almost 1.5 million of our most vulnerable pensioners with nothing at all from the pension credit?

Maria Eagle: I do not accept that. The hon. Gentleman mistakes a target for a ceiling. We want everyone who is entitled to pension credit to take up their entitlement, and in constituencies where there is a proactive approach from local agencies in connection with local services, we can make a big difference. There is no reason why that target should be the end of take-up, and we want everyone to take up their entitlement. However, the Conservative party's pension plans would pay three fifths of their proposed spend to the richest pensioners and only one fifth to the poorest. That is a typical Tory policy.

Colin Challen: What has been the take-up of pension credit in Morley and Rothwell.

Maria Eagle: As at 31 January, 3,609 pensioner households in Morley and Rothwell, comprising 4,343 individuals, were in receipt of pension credit. That is a 24 per cent. increase on take-up of the minimum income guarantee.

Colin Challen: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that answer, which shows that nearly 1,200 pensioner households are now receiving extra money from the Government and are therefore better off than they were four or five months ago. I should like to take the opportunity to thank the Pension Service and its staff in Leeds for helping me to run several pensioner advice sessions last year to try to help pensioners to claim their due. I am slightly concerned, however, that the level of award in my constituency is 14 per cent. lower than the national average. I do not believe, at first sight, that the demographic make-up of my constituency merits that lower award. Will my hon. Friend meet me to study an intensive analysis of why that is the case and to consider ways of improving take-up?

Maria Eagle: I congratulate my hon. Friend on his efforts to improve take-up in his constituency. He has not only helped the local Pension Service to hold surgeries, but been active in other ways to try to increase the level of take-up. My hon. Friend the Minister for Pensions would be more than happy to meet my hon. Friend the Member for Morley and Rothwell (Mr. Challen) to discuss the points that he has raised. However, the average award made to his constituents who were claiming the minimum income guarantee and are now claiming pension credit is £37.62 a week. Although that is slightly below the Great Britain average, that money will none the less be very welcome to those pensioners, and I am sure that they are very pleased to receive it.

Simon Hughes: What the take-up of pension credit in London has been since its introduction; and if he will make a statement.

Malcolm Wicks: I am pleased to report that as at 31 January, there were 239,000 pensioner households in London, comprising approximately 284,000 Londoners, receiving pension credit.

Simon Hughes: I am grateful to the Minister for that answer. I tie it in with an answer that he gave me in writing last week, which showed that about 220,000 people across Greater London are as yet not claiming pension credit. Whatever our difference of view on the issue, will he accept that if so many people in need of that money are still not claiming it, one way of immediately giving them the necessary information would be to send out with their council tax bills—which they do not like—some information that might help them to pay those bills? That information could be sent to all the households in Greater London if the Minister's Department could get it organised in the next few weeks.

Malcolm Wicks: As I explained earlier in the Scottish context, it is sensible for us to have a planned and phased take-on. The hon. Gentleman and his colleagues would be the first to complain—they are often the first to complain anyway—if we had written to everyone so quickly that we could not answer the phones or deal with the resulting applications. We are doing this in the proper way, which makes sense for Londoners and others. Although there has already been great progress—involving more than 4,000 households in the hon. Gentleman's constituency, for example—we are continuing to write to Londoners, and we are determined to increase take-up through different methods, including home visits, which are proving very successful.

John Cryer: I accept what my hon. Friend says, but does he recognise that in some constituencies there are many pensioners who do not have a great deal of money coming in on a weekly or monthly basis, but who have savings that they have built up over the years? The savings threshold means that those people are excluded from the pension credit. Is there any possibility of raising that threshold, so that pensioners such as those who recently came to my advice surgery to tell me that they were not entitled to pension credit could be allowed into the system?

Malcolm Wicks: I am pleased to tell my hon. Friend that more than 2,000 people in his constituency are benefiting from pension credit so far. Under the old system of income support or the minimum income guarantee, any pound of extra savings from a work pension or money in the Post Office was knocked off pound for pound. One of the key factors about the pension credit is that, for the first time, we are rewarding those who have done the right thing, as it were, by saving.

Patrick McLoughlin: Has it worked?

Malcolm Wicks: Yes, it has worked. The savings credit is rewarding people, which is why we now have so many gainers from pension credit. There will always be a cut-off point, and there will always be some who apply and who are disappointed, but that is the logic of a scheme that seeks to target the poorest and most hard-pressed pensioners, including many of the very elderly and the roughly two thirds of recipients who are women and who are now gaining from pension credit.

Pension Protection Fund

Gregory Barker: If he will make a statement on his proposed pension protection fund.

Malcolm Wicks: The pension protection fund will play a key role in the Government's plan of action significantly to improve protection for pension scheme members and to create greater confidence in pensions in general. For the first time ever, members of defined-benefit pension schemes based in the UK can rest assured that they will always receive a pension, even if their company goes bankrupt leaving the pension scheme underfunded.

Gregory Barker: I thank the Minister for that answer, but will he tell the House how many people have had their pension affected by company insolvency since 1997, and when these plans are actually going to be put in place? Will he also undertake to look into the case of Ballast Wiltshier—a company owned by the Dutch company Ballast Nedem—which was acquired and subsequently liquidated? As a result, a constituent of mine can now expect only a fraction of the pension that he was formerly entitled to, although the parent company is still operating profitably in the Netherlands.

Malcolm Wicks: I shall be happy to consider the details of that case and to discuss it with the hon. Gentleman. I am grateful to him for raising that important matter. The Bill will be published, as we know—[Hon. Members: "Soon?"] Very soon. Depending on the will of Parliament, we are working towards implementation of the fund and other key aspects of the provisions in the spring of next year.

Anne Begg: The new pension protection fund proposed in the "soon to come along very imminently" Bill will obviously not be retrospective. May I add my voice to those who have already asked the Government seriously to consider giving some kind of compensation to pensioners who have lost their pension entitlement as a result of the collapse of their occupational pension scheme? I have a number of such constituents who were involved in the Richards scheme, which is one of the schemes having difficulties at the moment.

Malcolm Wicks: I hear my hon. Friend's statement, but cannot add anything to what the Secretary of State and I have said. However, the Secretary of State, other colleagues and I have met some of the workers who are affected, and we have a clear understanding of the reality facing them.

Paul Holmes: When the pension protection fund is introduced, hopefully in 2005, it will be welcome, but it would have been more welcome if it had been introduced as long ago as 2000, when Ros Altmann, a former Government adviser, warned of the coming crisis and urged the adoption of such a scheme. However, as we have heard, the fund offers nothing to people who lost their pension between 1997 and 2000, such as constituents of mine who worked for Chesterfield Cylinders, Dema Glass and Coalite Products Ltd. Can the Minister not offer any hope of compensation to such people, especially those who worked in the steel industry and were compelled by the Government to make payments into their pension?

Malcolm Wicks: The Secretary of State and I have already answered those questions, and I did so again just now. We are listening to sensible suggestions, and have met concerned MPs, their constituents and affected workers. We cannot say anything at this stage because we do not want to offer false hope, but we are listening very carefully.

Return to Work

Sally Keeble: What measures through the social security system are being taken to help mothers who want to return to work.

Chris Pond: We want to give parents real choices about whether to work, and we will continue to take measures to support mothers who want to return to work. Our new deal for lone parents has already helped more than 200,000 mothers into work. We are making child care affordable and accessible through the child care component of the new tax credits and the extra places created through our national child care strategy, including Sure Start and a network of children's centres, including one in my hon. Friend's constituency, offering early learning alongside child care.

Sally Keeble: I certainly welcome the measures set out by my hon. Friend, but does he accept that many single mothers with young children want to be able to get back to nursing and teaching? University College Northampton, which is in my patch, provides extremely good courses, but I receive quite a lot of complaints, because single parents cannot make the benefits from the social security and child care systems work with the student finance system. Would my hon. Friend look into that with colleagues from other Departments, to make it possible for lone parents with children to get training, particularly in nursing and teaching, so that they can get those valuable jobs?

Chris Pond: My hon. Friend will be aware that student nurses can claim child tax credit. However, as the skills White Paper highlighted, we need to make sure that there is better co-ordination between the support provided for students and support generally for people on benefits. About 400,000 people who are receiving support through the benefits system are pursuing further education, but we recognise the need to work with our colleagues in the Department for Education and Skills to make sure that we fit the various pieces of the jigsaw together.

Private Pensions

Andrew Robathan: If he will make a statement on private pension provision.

Andrew Smith: The Government are committed to encouraging private funded provision by people who can afford to save. As set out in the document that we published last week, we want to empower individuals to take control of their retirement planning with the information that they need to make informed choices about working and saving. That is complemented by the Government's legislative programme of member protection and simplification. The Government are also committed to action, including legislation, to combat age discrimination and give people more choice about the timing and pace of their retirement.

Andrew Robathan: The Secretary of State said that the Government are encouraging private pension provision, but he will not be unaware of the decline in the value of pension funds over the past couple of years, largely due to the stock market decline. At the same time, however, as a former Chief Secretary to the Treasury, does he acknowledge that the Government played a role, because after the abolition of advance corporation tax in 1997 there was a pension fund raid, which took £35 billion out of pension funds? How will that encourage people to make private pension provision?

Andrew Smith: I do not accept the hon. Gentleman's argument. He omitted to mention that the dividend tax credit—I believe that that is what he was referring to—was part of a thoroughgoing reform of corporate taxation, which included 3p in the pound off the rate of corporation tax. Moreover, while his colleagues on the Front Bench shed many crocodile tears about this, they have made no commitment to reverse the policy.

Occupational Pensions

Peter Luff: When he last met representatives of trade unions to discuss the future of occupational pension schemes.

Malcolm Wicks: We have frequent contacts with trade unions and other partners concerning pensions. For example, I met the general secretary of the TUC, Brendan Barber, shortly before Christmas. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State met members of the TUC last week to discuss issues concerning women and pensions.

Peter Luff: I am glad to hear that the Government are talking to representatives of workers, such as workers affected by the collapse of company pension schemes. In those discussions with trade unions and victims of collapsed schemes such as Kalamazoo, which affected many of my constituents, would it not help us if we knew the exact cost of retrospective compensation? At Question Time a month ago, the Secretary of State said in answer to a question from my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Mr. Hogg):
	"These are precisely the issues that the Government have been looking into. When I am in a position to report to the House on the outcome of these inquiries and deliberations, I shall of course do so."—[Official Report, 12 January 2004; Vol.416, c. 514.] When will we know the cost of retrospective compensation?

Malcolm Wicks: In terms of listening to sensible suggestions and reflecting on these matters, the issue of cost is obviously vital. That is why it is a complex issue. I agree with the hon. Gentleman that cost issues must be considered in this context. Sadly, I cannot add to what has been said by me and by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State this afternoon on this important issue.

Paul Flynn: Why did my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State say that he is reluctant to compensate occupational pensioners retrospectively because a substantial proportion of the public are not occupational pensioners, when 100 per cent. of average families are paying £16 a week in compensation and subsidies to farmers even though 99 per cent. of them are not farmers?

Malcolm Wicks: My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has said that that issue—that most taxpayers are probably not members of final salary schemes—is one that we must take into account in assessing the proposals that are put to us.

Incapacity Benefit

Dave Watts: What measures he is taking to help those on incapacity benefit to get back to work.

Maria Eagle: We are committed to ensuring that people on sickness and incapacity benefits get support to return to work. The new deal for disabled people has already helped more than 25,000 placements of people into work. But we recognise that we need to do more. That is why we are piloting the measures in "pathways to work", giving people on incapacity benefits early and continuing support from specialist advisers, access to a range of condition management programmes, and improved financial incentives for returning to work.

Dave Watts: May I inform my hon. Friend that unemployment in my constituency is now down to 3 per cent? However, there are still 13,000 people on incapacity benefit in St. Helens. The local authority and the chamber of commerce are putting together a plan to try to deal with this important matter. Will my hon. Friend assure me that her Department will do all that it can to support this important initiative?

Maria Eagle: I can give my hon. Friend that assurance. I am glad to hear him say that there are some locally devised programmes that are being considered in addition to what we are trying to do nationally. We are talking of one of the great remaining challenges in respect of employment. We know that there are many people on sickness and incapacity benefit—up to 1 million—who say, according to surveys, that they would like to work. Until recently there has not been enough help in place to ensure that they can meet that ambition. We are determined to ensure that we find the best way of putting support into place, and that is what we are trying to do.

Disability Discrimination Act

Anthony D Wright: What plans he has to publicise the introduction of changes in 2004 to the Disability Discrimination Act 1995.

Maria Eagle: In October, those providing goods, services and facilities, whether for payment or not, will have to make reasonable adjustments to physical barriers that prevent access for disabled people. At the same time, the obligation not to discriminate against disabled people in employment will be extended to employers of fewer than 15 staff. These are welcome improvements for disabled people. We are undertaking information work to advertise these new requirements in conjunction with the Disability Rights Commission. This includes direct mail, advertising, website and media activity in addition to recognising those who do well through initiatives such as "access all areas" awards.

Anthony D Wright: I thank my hon. Friend for that response. I congratulate her and the Government on doing more for disabled people than any other Government in the past 25 years. With the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, the Government will extend the definition of disability to certain groups, including those with HIV infection, cancer and multiple sclerosis. I ask the Minister also to consider those people who suffer from ME, which has now again been recognised by the Government and by the chief medical officer as a debilitating illness and one that should be recognised as falling within the Disability Discrimination Act.

Maria Eagle: I know that my hon. Friend is the chair of the all-party group on ME, and I congratulate him on his interest in the subject, which has not always been top of the popularity lists, so I am grateful to him for taking such an interest. I am not aware of any difficulties encountered by those with ME that relate to the definition in the Disability Discrimination Act. Unlike cancer and HIV, where people can suffer discrimination in advance of having any symptoms, it would be unusual for anyone to be diagnosed with ME before they had had symptoms. However, if he is aware of any specific problems in his capacity as a Member of Parliament or as chairman of the all-party group, I would be more than happy to listen to what he has to say on the subject.

Morecambe Bay (Deaths)

Geraldine Smith: (urgent question): To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if she will make a statement on the measures that the Government intend to introduce to regulate the activities and operations of gangmasters following the recent tragedy in Morecambe bay.

Alun Michael: I start by underlining the fact that the death of 19 Chinese cocklers in Morecambe bay is a human tragedy. The deaths happened in horrific circumstances and shocked the local community, as they shocked us all. I recognise that the first reaction of my hon. Friend the Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (Geraldine Smith) and her local constituents was that of human sympathy for the dead and the survivors. We extend our sympathy to the families and friends of all involved.
	This incident is not the first involving migrant or illegal workers, but it involves the largest number of work-related deaths since the Piper Alpha tragedy some years ago. We must do all that we can to prevent another tragedy of this sort. The efforts of the rescue services were exemplary and I pay tribute to the professionals involved and to the local volunteers, who played a vital and courageous part in the rescue attempts.
	Lancashire police have already made significant progress in their hunt for the people involved in organising the cockle pickers, and three men and two women have been arrested. While the police investigations are continuing, it would be premature to comment further on the specfics of the case.
	The exploitative activities of some gangmasters are already well understood. Gangmasters bring together and supply a flexible work force to meet the changing demands of employers. Historically, that activity has been associated with planting and harvesting agricultural crops, but, as this latest incident shows, gangmasters appear to be becoming active in other areas too. The Government have been active in seeking to tackle this difficult and complex area, and the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee has undertaken an extremely helpful inquiry.
	The activity undertaken by gangmasters is not inherently illegal, and some run legitimate businesses. Indeed, there are farmers and growers who would face great difficulties without such a supply of labour. However, it is clear that a number of gangmasters meet shortages of seasonal and casual labour, in the agricultural and horticultural sectors in particular, by supplying non-EU citizens working in the UK illegally. They are also known to supply UK nationals working illegally while in receipt of benefit. Other illegal activity includes non-payment of the minimum wage, tax, national insurance and VAT. Those abuses of workers, some of whom do not have a voice due to their illegal status, cannot be condoned.
	It has been suggested that the cockle picking industry in Morecambe bay should be regulated further. Cockling in Morecambe bay is regulated by the North Western and North Wales sea fisheries committee, operating under byelaws confirmed by DEFRA. Some 700 permits have been issued to individual fishermen to date. Numbers cannot be restricted under the current permit scheme. Further, sea fisheries committees have no powers to limit public activity in the bay to daylight hours on safety grounds. It is not clear at this stage whether the Chinese cocklers involved in last week's tragedy had permits. Applicants have to provide proof of identity, such as a national insurance number, and photographic identification.
	There have also been calls for regulation of gangmasters, as my hon. Friend said in her question. As I explained to the House last week, DEFRA fully supports the work of Operation Gangmaster. That co-ordinates enforcement activity in relation to gangmasters and brings together the key Departments with an interest, which include the Department for Work and Pensions, which takes the lead, the Inland Revenue, Customs and Excise, the immigration service and others, including DEFRA, as required. As I reported to the House last week, this work is delivering results. However, incidents such as the one in Morecambe bay last week show that we cannot relax our efforts.
	The Gangmaster (Licensing) Bill, a private Member's Bill, will be presented to the House by my hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrewshire (Jim Sheridan) for Second Reading on 27 February. The Bill seeks to curb the exploitative activities of gangmasters operating in agriculture by introducing a statutory licensing scheme. The Government fully support the objectives of the Bill. Like hon. Members in all parts of the House, the Government wish to see an end to the misery and exploitation that unscrupulous gangmasters operating outside the law can cause. The Government's normal approach is to consider alternatives to statutory regulation first, and we have been working very closely with the Ethical Trading Initiative to establish whether an industry-led accreditation scheme would be effective in curbing the exploitative activities of certain gangmasters. That work is continuing.
	In this case, we appear to be dealing with criminal gangs. Such people will take no notice of a non-statutory solution. As my hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrewshire said on the radio this morning, we can never legislate for people who are determined to undermine any kind of laws. The Government have not ruled out legislation, although we have yet to reach a final conclusion on the merits of a statutory licensing scheme. However, I recognise the depth of support that he has for his Bill, and we are carefully considering it with colleagues in other Departments. If a licensing scheme is introduced, the work done in association with the Ethical Trading Initiative will provide a valuable contribution to any statutory licensing scheme that may be introduced.
	Gangmasters who operate outside the law cannot be allowed to continue to put workers' lives at risk. The Government will therefore ensure that the full force of the law is brought to bear on those committing these crimes.

Geraldine Smith: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for his comments, and especially his very positive comments about possible regulation of gangmasters. I hope that he will support the private Member's Bill introduced by my hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrewshire (Jim Sheridan) and that Government time will be provided to allow it to proceed through Parliament.
	I appreciate the fact that my right hon. Friend sent a message of condolence to the families and friends of the 19 young people who died so tragically last Thursday evening while picking cockles in Morecambe bay. What happened has appalled people in my constituency. There is a deep sense of sorrow and sympathy, and people feel that some good must come out of this appalling tragedy. May I, too, pay tribute to the magnificent efforts of the emergency services, which acted in atrocious weather conditions on Thursday night and worked so hard, displaying remarkable courage? They were fantastic and they deserve our full support.
	What measures could be introduced to regulate public fisheries such as Morecambe bay? At present, just about anyone can collect cockles 2 miles out into the bay. Often, they will know little or nothing of the dangers of Morecambe bay. What can we do to improve health and safety, and what urgent steps can be taken? One thing that we should think of doing immediately is closing that public fishery during the hours of darkness. People should not be working out in Morecambe bay in the dark. I will be interested to hear my right hon. Friend's comments. Will he arrange for me to meet the Fisheries Minister as soon as possible can so that we can consider possible legislation for Morecambe bay?
	Finally, I hope that some good comes out of this appalling tragedy. I hope that we can stop the exploitation not only of foreign workers, but of British workers. Some of these gangmasters are absolutely despicable, ruthless and evil people. The reputable gangmasters—after all, there are some decent people who employ casual labour, and we must give them our support—would welcome legislation. I would like the Government to support the private Member's Bill or introduce legislation as soon as possible.

Alun Michael: On my hon. Friend's last point, I agree that exploitation must be tackled, whoever the victims are. Anything we can do to strengthen the hands of those who provide important labour legitimately while observing proper health and safety and employment regulation must be right. My hon. Friend is right that some good must come out of such a tragedy. I endorse everything she said about the courage of the rescue workers and the conditions in which they had to work.
	My hon. Friend asked about the regulation of access and for action to close off access during the hours of darkness. Members will recognise the common sense of that proposal. However, access is regulated under the Sea Fisheries Regulation Act 1966, which allows closure of access for fisheries reasons, such as conservation of stocks and protection of the environment. There is not the ability to do what she suggests through that avenue. We are looking at whether other legislation would allow access to be closed for public safety reasons. If that proves to be impossible, clearly we will have to look at ways to tackle the issue.
	I am sure that the Fisheries Minister would be pleased to meet my hon. Friend to discuss these matters. I and other ministerial colleagues are happy to respond to the concerns that she has raised, which have been raised over time by a number of organisations, including the Transport and General Workers Union, which supports the private Member's Bill.

James Paice: On behalf of the Opposition, I join in the expressions of sympathy and condolence to the families and friends of those who died in such horrendous circumstances. In particular, I join the hon. Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (Geraldine Smith) in paying tribute to her constituents and others—the lifeboat and helicopter crews, the coastguard and the police—who risked their own lives in trying to save others.
	It seems clear to me that those who lost their lives were victims in many different ways, not just because they lost their lives, but because they were working for gangmasters for very little money while living in conditions that would seem squalid to all of us. Like the Minister, I welcome the news of some arrests earlier today, but clearly we await the outcome of those investigations.
	Many people will be concerned by the Minister's words. Is it not the truth that the tragedy sadly highlights the failure of the Government's policy on illegal working and on immigration and asylum, and their failure to fulfil their own commitments to combat unscrupulous gangmasters and remove illegal immigrants? Those of us who represent East Anglian constituencies know full well the role of good gangmasters in the food industry. The majority are fully legitimate, look after their staff and are used by responsible farmers and growers. But there is ample evidence—there has been for some time—that perhaps up to 1,000 are not so scrupulous.
	Last year's Select Committee report, to which the Minister referred, stated:
	"It appears to us that Operation Gangmaster serves as a convenient reference point for Ministers to give the impression that the Government is doing far more about dealing with the problems associated with gangmasters than is the case."
	That was partly based on the statement of Lord Whitty in evidence to the Committee, when he said:
	"We do not have a sufficiently comprehensive view of the situation."
	If that is the case, why not?
	Operation Gangmaster has been in existence for six months. Only three months before that statement, the Government had to respond to the private Member's Bill proposed by my hon. Friend the Member for Boston and Skegness (Mr. Simmonds). The Government did not give that Bill a clear passage.
	The last Conservative Government's Asylum and Immigration Act 1996 made it unlawful to employ any illegal immigrants. In the first four years, there were a total of 34 prosecutions. In 2001, there was just one. How many prosecutions have there been since then?
	In recent months, sadly, three suspected Kurdish gang workers were killed in collision with a train in Worcestershire. Following a house fire in King's Lynn, 36 Chinese were discovered living there illegally and working in the food industry. That led to 60 arrests. Can the Minister tell the House how many of those people were deported? In November 2002, 20 illegal Chinese workers were arrested in the Wirral after returning from a cockling expedition. How many of them were deported? In August 2003, 37 suspected illegal Chinese workers were arrested in Morecambe bay. How many of them were deported? Last year, the Minister for Citizenship and Immigration is reported to have said:
	"The Government is cracking down on illegal working and making good progress in removing increasing numbers of immigration offenders from the UK."
	Can the Minister tell us how many have been removed?
	In the case of this tragedy, it is reported that nine of the survivors were asylum seekers and five were unknown to the authorities. How was it that the Government did not know where those asylum seekers were? What happened to the tracking systems that the Government were going to introduce? Do the Government agree with the reported remarks of Thomas Chan of the Chinese in Britain Forum that the problem will continue unless the Government are more robust about illegal immigration?
	Is it not clear that, as many people have said, this was a tragedy waiting to happen? The Government knew of the presence of large numbers of illegal immigrants working in Morecambe bay and of the risks involved in working there, but they did nothing. Within 48 hours of the tragedy, the police were able to track down the gangmasters and to make the arrests that we have heard about, whereas the Government agencies had failed for months and years. The Home Secretary appears on the media to declare that we need more migrant workers, yet does nothing to combat the ruthless exploitation of migrants who are working illegally for slave wages. Does not this tragedy expose the hypocrisy of inaction from a Government who talk tough but act weak while the vulnerable pay the price?

Alun Michael: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his initial words, including his conclusion that these individuals appear to have been victims in a variety of ways, but it is a pity that he took the opportunity to try to score political points, given that this Government have acted on this whole area, yet the previous Government did not. I think that he will find that his remarks were ill judged.
	The hon. Gentleman asked why we do not have a comprehensive view of what is going on. That point was addressed by my noble Friend Lord Whitty in another place. The reason is that we have a complex, changing problem that involves illegal activity. By definition, people do not undertake illegal activity in the open, so it is an area of considerable difficulty.
	The hon. Gentleman referred to several events that are in the public domain precisely because the Government and a variety of agencies are working together to tackle the problem. He rightly said that the Home Secretary has referred to wishing to see legitimate workers coming into this country to work. We need people working seasonally in this country, but they should be legitimate workers, not people who are being exploited in the way that the Select Committee identified.
	The hon. Gentleman asked what the Government are doing about the problem. In 2002–03, the positive outcomes achieved against gangmasters and their employees included the identification by the Department for Work and Pensions of 235 overpayments and 1,023 adjustments to benefits worth £405,000, thereby securing 138 sanctions and prosecutions. [Interruption.] The hon. Gentleman wanted to know whether there have been prosecutions, but when I give him the answer, all he can do is mock. I wish that he would take the issue more seriously.
	The Inland Revenue's specialist teams settled 46 inquiries and reviews, identifying unpaid tax and national insurance worth £4.3 million. There have been criminal prosecutions of 14 gangmasters for VAT offences, involving VAT of £5.9 million and resulting in prison sentences totalling 31 years. We do not say that enough has been done; that is why we are looking at the matter across Departments. In the past couple of weeks, I have had meetings with colleagues about what we can do to strengthen the work of Operation Gangmaster and to consider the private Member's Bill. The Government are determined to tackle the problem.

Hilton Dawson: Nothing can take away the wicked responsibility of the people who placed those poor souls and their fellow workers on the sands of Morecambe bay in such dangerous circumstances. However, in reviewing all aspects of the terrible tragedy, will the Government consider the effects of clause 55 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 and the potential effect of clause 7 of the Asylum (Treatment of Claimants, Etc.) Bill to ascertain whether making those who are perhaps failed asylum seekers destitute helps to create some of the circumstances in which people can be so cruelly and disgracefully exploited?

Alun Michael: I agree with my hon. Friend's first point about exploitation and the need to eradicate it. His point about the withdrawal of family income support applies to people whose applications for asylum have failed. That is a totally different set of circumstances. People who come into the country illegally may be exploited and such exploitation needs to be tackled, but that is not directly relevant to the problems that we are considering.

Norman Baker: On behalf of the Liberal Democrats, may I express our horror at the human tragedy in Morecambe, our sympathy to the families of those who were lost and our thanks to the emergency services and others who performed so well, as always, last week? Does not such an incident bring shame on our country? We have uncovered circumstances in which up to 30 or 40 people were living in a house and in some cases being paid as little as £1 a day for nine hours of back-breaking work. All of us should be concerned about that and learn lessons from it.
	Should not we do more to prosecute those who appear to be content cruelly to exploit migrant workers and pay them a pittance while making huge sums? Is the Minister aware that the revised figures issued last November show that, since 1997, there were only 22 prosecutions and eight convictions for employing a person subject to immigration controls? Although he referred to other prosecutions regarding VAT and so on, is he satisfied that the law is adequate and that sufficient enforcement is deployed to ensure that those responsible are caught and prosecuted?
	I am bound to reflect that the gangmasters are rightly being ruthlessly pursued in the case that we are considering—I am delighted by the law enforcement authorities' actions—but locals have known about such activity for some time. That suggests that this tragedy and others might have been avoided.
	I do not want to make this a party political point—the human tragedy is too great—but hon. Members from all parties must learn from it. The Select Committee on Environment, Fisheries and Food stated that it was
	"appalled by the lack of priority given to . . . illegal activity by gangmasters."
	I hope that we all find ways to try to deal with that. It also said that
	"no significant resources had been allocated",
	to Operation Gangmaster, that it had no targets and that there was no Minister to take overall responsibility. We might all have been caught unawares, but we must now try to deal with the issues and ensure that such an incident does not happen again.
	Will the Minister deal with the Select Committee's points, especially those about resources and ministerial responsibilities? Will he comment on links with the Home Office, the Department for Work and Pensions and especially the immigration service to ensure that the Government are providing as joined-up a response as possible? Does he accept that, although there is a need to regularise economic migration, thereby providing a genuine outlet for those whom we need in this country, there is an absolute need to clamp down on those who improperly exploit migrant workers?
	Will the Minister consider the suggestion of a requirement on farmers and growers to sign a form for the Home Office saying that they will pass on details of subcontractors responsible for employing labour? It would not have helped in the case that we are discussing, but it would provide some chance of keeping a check on some of the activities.

Alun Michael: The hon. Gentleman makes several important points and I am grateful for the constructive way in which he raised each issue. He is right to say that it is shameful that such circumstances exist and that "all of us"—his term—should do all that we can to eradicate such activity and prevent any such incident from happening again.
	We need to do more to prosecute those who are responsible. That is why so much work is going on throughout Government. As I said earlier, we are considering a complex and changing sphere of activity, where people are making a lot of money. Some people are undertaking that activity legitimately and others are not. It is important to get the best possible intelligence and co-operation between Departments, as he also pointed out, to achieve the best possible outcome.
	A variety of different ways exist in which prosecution can be undertaken because of the variety of different offences, whether in relation to health and safety, avoiding payment of tax or paying below the minimum wage. We are considering carefully whether the different forms of offence and enforcement can be simplified so that enforcement by all the agencies involved can be easier and simpler.
	The hon. Gentleman referred to the lack of targets in respect of Operation Gangmaster. There has been very good co-operation, as I know from talking to my noble Friend Lord Whitty, who has lead responsibility in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and has been doing a lot of work with colleagues. An effort has been made to get under the surface of the problems to their roots to see how to tackle and prevent such activity. I assure the hon. Gentleman that that co-operation is strong.
	It is difficult to set meaningful targets unless the scale of the problem to be eradicated is known. Targets for prosecution, for instance, do not necessarily help towards a minimisation of the activity. We need to improve the instruments available for the authorities so that undertaking such illegal activity does not pay. That is what we are trying to consider in terms of how the law might be treated.
	On the hon. Gentleman's point about passing on details, anyone who knows anything about this tragedy, or about other examples given by various hon. Members of people being put in impossible and unacceptable conditions, should feed that information to the authorities. We are trying to make sure that the authorities exchange information between each other so that enforcement can be crisp and effective on every occasion.

Andrew Miller: My right hon. Friend will know that, after the successful joint departmental action on 6 August last year in the Dee estuary, I wrote to the chief officers of all the Departments concerned to congratulate them on the work that they had undertaken. He will also know how difficult that action was, as although 420 people were interviewed and there were hundreds of questionable activities and offences, no illegal immigrants were identified. Will he ensure that any regulatory changes, including those with regard to the Dee estuary, which comes under a different regime—that of the Environment Agency Wales—have teeth? Clearly, toothless regulations are pointless. Will he ensure that the regulations target primarily those who co-ordinate the illegal activities: the ruthless gangmasters who appear to be responsible for the terrible tragedy that we have seen this weekend, which could occur in many other places around our coast unless co-ordinated action is taken—

Mr. Speaker: Order. Hon. Members' supplementary questions must be brief.

Alun Michael: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his comments. He refers rightly to the operations on the Dee estuary and to what those revealed. He identifies the heart of the problem by saying that this is a difficult and complex area. We always ought to bear it in mind in this place that laws cannot always prevent what they forbid. It is important not only to regulate but to make sure that regulations are enforceable. In many ways, what we need is an antisocial behaviour order for gangmasters rather than an increased bureaucracy. That is the way in which Departments are approaching the matter: looking for that which is effective to try to nip the problem in the bud rather than increasing the bureaucracy involved. I take my hon. Friend's points about making sure that regulations are enforceable to heart.

Tim Collins: Will the Minister join me in paying tribute to the professional and volunteer rescue workers from the northern end of Morecambe bay—including Arnside, Grange-over-Sands and Kendal in my constituency—who took part in the activities on Thursday night? This was a real tragedy, and it was a horrendous night for everyone.
	Will the Minister also understand, however, that there is real anger about all this in my constituency? Why, for months and months, were warnings from local residents and members of the legitimate Morecambe bay fishing community ignored? Why was no action taken until Friday morning? If it was so hard to find out what was going on and where it was going on, why were journalists—both local and national—able to track down dozens of people taking part in this activity within hours on Friday morning? Has there not been a gross dereliction of duty on the part of many of those responsible? Why has it taken bloodshed for action to be taken? Is it not time for Ministers to accept that there is a right and a wrong way for people to come into this country, and that members of ethnic communities who are scrupulous in observing the right regulations and legislation are among those who are angriest about the hundreds of thousands of people in our country who do not obey our laws and do not pay our taxes because of a Government who will not enforce proper border controls?

Alun Michael: There is a right and a wrong way to raise a point in the Chamber, if I may say so.
	I certainly join the hon. Gentleman in paying tribute to people from his constituency who were involved in the rescue effort. Indeed, I pay tribute to those who contributed to that effort, wherever they came from. It was a great credit to all of them, and it is a tragedy that those skills and that bravery had to be demonstrated in such tragic circumstances.
	The hon. Gentleman suggested that warnings had been ignored. It is always easy to place more emphasis on warnings after the event than before, but the circumstances, and how this came about, will need to be examined carefully. If there were warnings that were ignored, we will certainly need to look into it, but I am not aware that that is the case.
	The hon. Gentleman also suggested that journalists had been able to track people down immediately after the event. The police, too, appear to have been able to work very quickly. It sometimes takes an event—a tragedy—of this sort for a lot of information that has not been made available before suddenly to be made available. I hope that one of the consequences of what has happened will be that anyone anywhere in the country who knows of individuals being exploited will inform the authorities, whether those people are being exploited in the way that may have been involved in this case—we do not have all the facts yet—or in the manner highlighted by the report of the Select Committee on Environment, Food and Regional Affairs, so that together we can do all we can to avoid future tragedies.

Jim Sheridan: My Gangmaster (Licensing) Bill seeks only to protect workers wherever they are in Britain, regardless of their status in this country. I agree with what my right hon. Friend said about the work of the TGWU and other coalition partners who have supported the Bill. Does he agree with me that the voluntary code is not working, and that it is time for effective legislation? Can he flesh out what he said about sharing the objectives of the Bill, and help to end the human misery of what can only be described as modern slavery in today's society? Is it not time to move on? If it had been 19 dogs that had died at Morecambe bay, the RSPCA would have launched a criminal investigation to ensure that it did not happen again. A life is a life, whether it is the life of a dog or the life of a Chinese worker. Effective legislation must be provided to give protection.

Alun Michael: I certainly agree that whoever is affected by a tragedy of this sort, human sympathy is needed. We must learn the lessons, and ensure that wherever possible such tragedies cannot happen in the future.
	My hon. Friend mentioned the work of the TGWU and its co-operation with other organisations. They include the National Farmers Union—and I must say that seeing the TGWU and the NFU on the same side gives one pause for thought. A number of organisations, including some representing the retail trade, are co-operating with a wide variety of interests, all of which understand different parts—different strands—of this complex problem.
	We share my hon. Friend's wish for measures that can help to end exploitation. We want to ensure that any legislation is effective, rather than only appearing to tackle the problem, or increasing the amount of bureaucracy without preventing the evils that my hon. Friend and I, along with my colleagues throughout Government, want to be eradicated.

Gillian Shephard: The Minister has spoken of the need for the Government to know the scale of the problem, yet Operation Gangmaster has been in existence since 1998. What has it been able to do to inform the Government about the number of migrant workers employed illegally by gangmasters? If it has not been able to provide that information, is he disappointed?

Alun Michael: It is always disappointing to know that there is a problem and to try to deal with it when it is difficult to pin down its scale, but, as I indicated earlier, no previous Govt took the steps that we have taken to try to tackle the problem—not just to measure it but actually to deal with it. I referred earlier to the public money that has been recovered and to the prosecutions that have taken place. We have made progress, but I agree with Members on both sides of the House that more needs to be done, so I hope that minds will have been concentrated in all organisations, as well as in the Government, to ensure that that happens in future.

Diane Abbott: The House is aware both of the need for seasonal casual labour in agriculture and of the strong emphasis that the Home Secretary has put on dealing with traffickers in illegal immigrants, but those 19 dead Chinese young people were treated little better than 19th-century coolie labour. Whatever people's immigration status, no one in Britain wants them to be treated like that—no one is mourning them, no one has claimed their bodies and their nearest and dearest probably still do not know that they are dead—so I urge the Minister to look very seriously indeed at licensing gangmasters.

Alun Michael: I have already indicated to the House that we are looking carefully at the private Member's Bill being promoted by my hon. Friend the Member for West Renfrewshire. Police activities are under way at present, so we should await full information before jumping to conclusions on some of the issues involved. It is difficult to respond to every aspect in this debate; there is the tragedy that took place last week in specific circumstances, but also the general activities of gangmasters about which the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Select Committee and many Members have made observations. Although we can talk about the general, the specific will need specific answers when we have full information and the result of the investigations.

Peter Luff: The Minister speaks of minds being concentrated by the tragedy, but should not minds in Government have been concentrated by the tragedy in my constituency seven months ago when three exploited vulnerable agricultural workers travelling in a minibus were killed by the train in which I was travelling? Is it not true that although personal tragedy is a real reason for quiet voices in the Chamber, it does not mean that the Government can escape criticism for inaction? The Government's response to the report of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee on gangmasters, although full of fine words and platitudes, shows no sense of urgency to deal with the problem. When will the Government show that sense of urgency?

Alun Michael: The trouble is that the House sometimes shows a sense of urgency when a tragedy takes place—not only the one last week but the one in the hon. Gentleman's constituency, to which he referred—yet the work of the Government goes on between such events. From discussions with Lord Whitty, who has been working with colleagues across the Government, I know how much work has been going on to tackle the problem of gangmasters and those who are exploited by them. It is not right to underestimate the amount of work and effort, not just of Ministers and Departments but also of those who work in the enforcement agencies. I referred in an earlier response to the figures that demonstrate how much work is being done. We are dealing with a difficult and almost intractable problem, to try to find mechanisms that will really work to eradicate it. I agree with the hon. Member for Mid-Worcestershire (Mr. Luff) that the problem is important and that we should concentrate on it—that is why the Government are indeed concentrating on it.

John Denham: My right hon. Friend said that he would use the full force of the law. Does he accept that the fines in prosecutions for the employment of illegal labour are at trivial levels? Will he now act on the recommendation, made just two weeks ago by the all-party Select Committee on Home Affairs, that the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, which can be used to seize the assets of drug dealers and of people traffickers, should also be used to seize the assets of those people who employ illegal workers and subject them to the sort of conditions in which tragedies happen?

Alun Michael: There are examples bordering on the trivial, and I agree with my right hon. Friend on the need for concern about that. I believe that in a recent case a fine of about £100 was given, which clearly does not get across the message that the matter is taken seriously by the courts, or, indeed, by Parliament, but responses from Members on both sides of the House demonstrate the seriousness with which the House approaches the matter. Fines of up to £5,000 are possible, and I believe that it applies per worker, so we could have multiples of £5,000 fines in respect of the number of people employed. We shall certainly keep the matter under review.

UK Supreme Court

Christopher Leslie: With permission, I should like to repeat a statement made in the other place by the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs on the proposed new UK supreme court.
	On 14 July we published for consultation our proposals to establish a supreme court for the United Kingdom. We published last week a summary of responses, and today I am setting out our plans in detail—a key element of our comprehensive programme of constitutional modernisation and reform, aimed at enhancing the credibility and effectiveness of public institutions and increasing trust and accountability.
	Just as our proposals on the judicial functions of the office of Lord Chancellor rest on the separation of powers between the judiciary and the Executive, so too with our court system: we believe that the time is right to make a clear and transparent separation between the judiciary and the legislature. By creating a supreme court, we will separate fully the final court of appeal from Parliament.
	Nothing in the proposal intends or implies any criticism of the way in which the current Appellate Committee or its members have discharged their functions. They are not in the other place today, because they are at work hearing cases. They have asked for it to be made clear that they do not intend any discourtesy by their absence: indeed, it is another manifestation of the singular consequences of situating our highest court within the legislature. The Government take the view that, as part of our plans to sustain and enhance the vital independence of the judiciary, the present position is no longer sustainable. The time has come for the UK's highest court to move out from under the shadow of the legislature.
	The Government have been in close consultation with the Law Lords since these proposals were announced and they are aware of the detailed proposals being put before Parliament today. We will introduce legislation to create a supreme court. Under our proposals, the supreme court for the United Kingdom will replace the existing system whereby the Law Lords operate as a Committee of the House of Lords. The supreme court will exercise the same appellate jurisdiction as the Appellate Committee exercises, in respect both of the courts from which appeals may lie and of reviews by appellate petition. There will be no changes to the rules governing leave to appeal.
	The supreme court will also take over the jurisdiction of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in respect of devolution issues under the Scotland Act 1998, the Government of Wales Act 1998 and the Northern Ireland Act 1998. The creation of a separate and free-standing supreme court does not in any way imply the creation of a new body of United Kingdom law. Being the ultimate court of appeal in the UK does not mean that the court hears "UK appeals".
	As is currently the case with hearings in the Appellate Committee, decisions made in an appeal from a court in one of the three jurisdictions within the UK will be of binding effect only within that jurisdiction, and of persuasive effect in the others. Only on devolution issues, as at present, will the decisions of the court be binding in all legal proceedings. The avenues of appeals from Scottish courts will remain the same for the supreme court as they were for the House of Lords, so that only Scottish civil appeals will be heard by the new supreme court. The final court of appeal for criminal cases in Scotland will continue to be the High Court of Justiciary.
	As the key objective is to achieve a full and transparent separation between the judiciary and the legislature, it follows that justices of the supreme court, other holders of full-time judicial office, or retired justices of the supreme court who continue to sit, will no longer be entitled to sit or to vote in the House of Lords, or to participate in the work of Parliament for as long as they hold their judicial appointment. The same will apply to the Lord Chief Justice, the Lord President of the Court of Session and the Master of the Rolls. I pay tribute to the valuable contribution to the work of the other place that they and the Law Lords have made.
	Judges of the new supreme court will be known as "Justices of the Supreme Court". We propose that the first 12 justices will be those holding office as Lords of Appeal in Ordinary at the commencement of the new supreme court. Two of them are from Scotland and one from Northern Ireland, so their appointment would ensure an appropriate balance of expertise across the UK at the creation of the new court, as well as providing continuity. Qualifications for appointments will be unchanged.
	Appointments will be made on the recommendation of a new supreme court appointments commission, to be convened when there is an actual or impending vacancy. The composition of the commission—consisting of members of the appointments commissions from across the United Kingdom, with Members of Parliament and the Government ineligible for membership—guarantees nominations free from political interference and influence. The president of the supreme court will chair the appointments commission and the deputy president will also be an ex-officio member. That will ensure a proper balance of lay and judicial input to its deliberations. The commission will consider candidates eligible for appointment by reference to criteria that have been approved by Parliament, subject to the overriding principle of merit. It will have a duty, each time it meets, to survey the field of all eligible candidates across the three jurisdictions and focus on the most meritorious.
	The commission will recommend to the Secretary of State a minimum of two and a maximum of five candidates for each vacancy. On receipt of the nominations, the Secretary of State will be under a statutory duty to ensure that the court has, among its members, sufficient knowledge and expertise of the law in each United Kingdom jurisdiction. In doing so, he will be required to consult the senior judiciary in each of those three jurisdictions. The Secretary of State will then submit a name from the shortlist to the Prime Minister, who will make a recommendation to Her Majesty accordingly. There will also be an obligation to canvass the views of the First Minister of Scotland, the First Minister of Wales and the First Minister and Deputy First Minister of Northern Ireland, if responsibility for criminal justice matters has been devolved to the Northern Ireland Assembly.
	The requirement for a longer shortlist than is presented to the Secretary of State for vacancies for judicial offices in England and Wales derives from the UK-wide jurisdiction of the supreme court. Justices of the supreme court must be the best available in the UK as a whole, but the court must always contain the necessary breadth of experience of each constituent jurisdiction. To balance those requirements, it will be necessary for the Secretary of State to consult on a wider range of candidates. It is envisaged that there would never be less than two Scottish justices, and there would normally be one justice from Northern Ireland.
	The supreme court will be administered as a distinct constitutional entity. Special arrangements will apply to its budgetary and financial arrangements to reflect its unique status, and it will present annual reports, which will be made available not only to the Westminster Parliament, but to the Scottish Parliament, the Northern Ireland Assembly and the National Assembly for Wales. The chief executive, who will be appointed through fair and open competition, will be responsible for accounting for the court's finances and will report on a day-to-day basis directly to the justices of the court. The court will have a staff of its own, working to that chief executive.
	The supreme court will stand at the apex of the judicial systems of England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. As such, it is appropriate that it should be based in London, as the capital city of the United Kingdom. However, it may be appropriate, on occasion, to hear cases—such as devolution cases, or cases raising issues specific to Scottish or Northern Ireland law—in other parts of the United Kingdom. However, it would be for the president of the supreme court to decide when it would be appropriate for it to sit elsewhere.
	It is clearly important that the new supreme court should be housed in an appropriate building. I have therefore commissioned an extensive property search to identify suitable locations. That search has been based upon a statement of requirements that has been discussed and agreed with the Law Lords and has considered a wide range of options—both commercial sites and those already on the Government estate. An evaluation is currently being conducted to identify the preferred location. I will seek the views of the Law Lords, the First Ministers of the devolved Administrations and the Lord President of the Council before any final decision is made. Until that process has been completed, it could be prejudicial to our commercial position to disclose all the details. However, I will undertake to inform both Houses of the preferred option at an appropriate time.
	There will be other opportunities for debate and scrutiny of those proposals in both Houses. I also look forward to receiving the report of the Select Committee on Constitutional Affairs, which will comment not only on the supreme court, but on the judicial appointment commission for England and Wales. I believe that those proposals will result in a supreme court that will be, in the words of the noble and learned Lord Steyn,
	"a badge of independence and neutrality . . . a potent symbol of the allegiance of our country to the rule of law".

Alan Duncan: I am grateful to the Minister for early sight of the statement. I do not ever want to say that the House should not have statements, but my gratitude is somewhat tempered by our growing despair at the piecemeal manner in which the Government's proposals are unfolding.
	The proposals' origins lie in a farcical reshuffle in which the Prime Minister's approach to constitutional matters was paraded as fact and then immediately transformed into fiction. The Lord Chancellor was publicly sawn in half by the Prime Minister—no mean feat, I have to say—and then magically reappeared in a puff of smoke. There then followed a private deal with an incumbent judge, which bypasses proper parliamentary procedures or which, at the very least, has pre-empted them. That was then followed by a statement.
	Now, a matter of 14 days later, we have another statement. Apart from an ill-attended debate in Westminster Hall on the supreme court, there has been no debate at all in the House, no public debate on the proposals—let alone any public call for them—and only on Thursday, for the first time, will there be the debate in the Lords, which is long overdue. There have been consultation documents and published reactions to them, but no comprehensive response whatsoever from the Government to that consultation process.
	This statement today gives the impression that the Government are making it all up as they go along. It contains no intellectual coherence at all; rather it contains many practical dangers and backward steps. It is a mess. Once again the Government show that they are incapable of understanding the difference between judicial independence and the separation of powers. They use the concepts interchangeably and therefore nonsensically. We have never had the separation of powers, and the Government's illogical appetite for establishing the separation of powers will come at the expense of the effective judicial independence that we already enjoy.
	The title of supreme court—in a facile replication of an American name—is itself a misnomer. A supreme court is supreme because it sits in adjudication of any dispute's conformity to the supreme authority of a written constitution. We have no such constitution, and therefore have nothing against which the supremacy of a court has to measure up. Indeed, this very statement admits, "The supreme court will exercise the same appellate jurisdiction as the Appellate Committee exercises". Why then this needless upheaval?
	Is there not another logical fallacy in the Government's position when they say, as if they think they are making a valid point, that "the key objective is to achieve a full and transparent separation between the judiciary and the legislature"? That is an absurd notion. The insinuation is that there is some sort of parliamentary influence over the courts. There quite clearly is not. But the influence of judges, with all their expertise within Parliament, is important, and that is going to disappear.
	May I add in passing that it is a bit rich for the Lord Chancellor to say that the Law Lords mean no discourtesy by being absent today because they are sitting in court? It is a most obvious discourtesy that the Lord Chancellor should make his statement when they have no option but to be absent. To describe this diary conflict as "another manifestation of the singular consequences of situating our highest court within the legislature" is a comment of such unparalleled triviality that it leaves the distinct impression that the Lord Chancellor is taking the mickey.
	This proposal may separate the judges from the legislature—and for no apparent benefit at all—but it is a perilous step backwards because it will extend the influence of the Executive over the judges. How can it be said that this proposal enhances either the separation of powers, or the independence of the judiciary, when the role of the Secretary of State, probably by then an ambitious youngster on the make sitting in this House—[Hon. Members: "Oh!"]—has been made central to the proposed judicial appointments procedure? Is it not the case that he will be able to exercise substantial discretion in selecting supreme court judges, and that he will be doing this from a highly politicised office? How is this an improvement on the present role of the Lord Chancellor in the selection of Law Lords, when he is circumscribed by having taken the judge's oath and by the conventions of his ancient office? Why do the Government have such contempt for convention when it has been shown to work so well over such a long period? Is it not the case that whereas the Lord Chancellor takes the judge's oath, the Secretary of State will not? What does the Minister understand by that? Is it not the case that the Lord Chancellor can accept no further political office and is therefore likely to protect judicial independence, whereas a future Secretary of State, who would probably sit in this House, would be subject to no such restriction?
	Will the Minister clarify the position of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council? It will continue to deal with appeals from overseas and other matters, so any possible savings from amalgamating the two bodies will not now arise. Will he now drop any such claim?
	What is the Government budget for the court building and for staffing the supreme court? Will the Minister confirm that the net cost, apart from judicial salaries, of running the existing Appellate Committee is in the order of a mere £200,000? Will he not accept that, especially in the absence of any perceived need for the proposal, even if it costs only a fraction of the dome it risks bringing discredit and derision to the entire project? How much will the chief executive of the new court be paid? The way things are going, that person's salary alone will double the current net costs of the court.
	The Government proposals are a hotch-potch of utterly shallow design. Changes of this magnitude should ideally enjoy consensual support. At the very least, they should have been argued for, shown to be necessary and proved to be better than what they replace. The Government owe it to the country to allow this House pre-legislative scrutiny of the entire package instead of making this fragmented series of announcements.
	The whole enterprise is a classic new Labour construct: it wins a momentary headline; it projects an image of radical momentum; it brings no benefit to anyone; it has shallow intellectual roots; it will probably cost a fortune; and it pollutes a proven structure with the taint of party politics. I say to the Government, "Nice try but bin it—you're wrong".

Christopher Leslie: Well, powerful stuff there, which did not include a single proposal from the Opposition about where they want to take the constitution in this country, whether they would repeal a new supreme court and whether they would reinstate the office of Lord Chancellor. We must find out a little bit more from the Opposition before their conservatism, which is cloaked by the hon. Gentleman's fine language, is exposed to the wider population. [Interruption.] The Opposition obviously do not want to see any change, believe that the status quo is sufficient and do not see any particular problem with a politician sitting at the heart of the judiciary. [Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker: Order. The Under-Secretary must be heard.

Christopher Leslie: I cannot make out whether the hon. Gentleman is saying that there has been too much scrutiny of the proposals—he bemoans our bringing them to the House for debate—or whether he is saying that there has not been enough scrutiny. On the one hand he attacks the Government for making sure that there is an opportunity to scrutinise the proposals in quite a lot of detail, but on the other he attacks the scrutiny as piecemeal. He must carefully think through his line of attack. It is right to give the details, and the time has come to separate the judiciary from the legislature, not only because the change brings clarity and transparency, but because, more importantly, it creates a more effective Parliament and final court of appeal, which will enable both entities to focus on their core roles.
	The hon. Gentleman asked a number of questions, one of which was about the title, "supreme court". Somehow he sees the title "supreme court" as inexorably connected with a written constitution, but that is not the case. We can have a supreme court—in effect, our highest court of appeal—and that is what we propose.
	The hon. Gentleman raises concerns about how the Executive are perhaps extending their influence over the judiciary, but nothing could be further from the truth. We intend to do precisely the opposite by removing Ministers' powers to be involved in the nomination process for the supreme court. It is also important to take the highest court of appeal out of the political realm by removing it from Parliament. If that is not enhancing independence, I do not know what is.
	The hon. Gentleman mentioned the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, and said that there was no particular issue on that. However, under that system, if there were to be an appeal on a devolution case that involved the National Assembly or the Scottish Parliament it would be heard, absurdly, by a Committee of the United Kingdom Parliament. That is not a sustainable position, which is why, by removing the highest court of appeal from Parliament, we are seeking to enable a more independent approach, and end that potential conflict of interests.
	The hon. Gentleman asked a number of questions on the building. As I have explained, we are searching for a potential location for the new supreme court. He focused on the cost, and it is proper that we take value for money into account, but we must also consider the quality of the facilities required by the highest court in our land. I happen to believe that the justice and court system is an exceptionally important part of our country and deserves the very best facilities available.
	The hon. Gentleman needs to reconsider his stance. Parliament makes the laws and the judiciary must apply them. We need that separation of powers, and this forward-looking, modernising step is overdue. I am glad that we can take it now.

Tam Dalyell: Inquiries that I have made to the apex of the Scottish legal establishment suggest that the Scottish position has been carefully addressed and that the establishment in Edinburgh is satisfied, so I thank my hon. Friend the Minister for that. However, is it not essential to the creation of a truly UK body that it be administered and financed separately from the English court system? Is this body to be run through the Department for Constitutional Affairs?

Christopher Leslie: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his comments on our conclusions on the relationship between the Scottish jurisdiction and the UK supreme court. It is indeed important that we have absolute respect for the three distinct jurisdictions in our country, and his second point touched on that. We do not want the United Kingdom supreme court to become subservient to the England and Wales jurisdiction, and that is not our proposal. As far as possible within the accounting rules that Parliament expects, we want that supreme court to have a separate accounting officer and separate budgetary arrangements. Although there will have to be some accountability to Parliament for all the taxpayers' money that is expended, we recognise the unique position of the UK supreme court in that respect.

Mark Oaten: I thank the Minister for his advance notice of the statement. Does he recognise, however, that although my party supports the move towards a supreme court, much good will has been lost through the Government's approach to consultation on the exercise? The proposals are designed to build trust in the system, but the Government will need to consult much more properly and widely in the months ahead if they are to gain the trust of the judicial system and Members of Parliament.
	On today's announcement, why do the Government want to require up to five names to be put to the Prime Minister? Does the Minister not acknowledge that that could lead to greater interference from the Prime Minister and accusations in the media over his reasons for choosing certain individual names from the list of five? Would it not be better to stick with the suggestion of having just two names in the first place?
	Does the Minister have concerns over the loss of expertise? We fully support the planned break in the link between the Lords and the justices, but current knowledge could then be lost from the other place. With that in mind, do the Government plan that those who have served as justices of the supreme court will be able to be appointed to the House of Lords afterwards? There might then be concerns, however, over accusations of political involvement because the Prime Minister had chosen certain individuals who had served as justices of the supreme court. Further to that, does the Minister have any plans to set an age of retirement for the new justices?
	Finally, the new building will be controversial. Will the Minister explain why it has to be sited in London, and will he assure us that the building will not be entirely new, with all the costs involved in that, but will be an existing site?

Christopher Leslie: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his approach, which is slightly more constructive than that of the official Opposition. He asked why London is the preferred location. It is an obvious thing to say, but given that London is the capital city of the United Kingdom, it should be the main permanent base for the supreme court. However, it would be open to the president of the supreme court to decide, if required, that the court could occasionally sit elsewhere. I will not rule out or rule in new buildings or refurbished buildings at this stage, as that would be prejudicial to commercial consideration of the matter.
	The hon. Gentleman asked about the age of retirement. We propose that 70 should be the normal retirement age for justices of the supreme court, and 75 if they are on the reserve or supplemental list. As for his comments about whether we should remove sitting judges from the second Chamber, I believe that it is right to do so, particularly if we want to underline the separation of the legislature and the judiciary. There is, of course, scope in the proposals for retiring justices to enter the House of Lords after they have concluded their contribution to the justice system. A shortlist of two to five names is necessary in these particular circumstances, given that appointments cover three jurisdictions—Northern Ireland, Scotland, and England and Wales. We need to ensure that we have the capability to reflect the full breadth of knowledge required for all those jurisdictions, and there is scope for that in the shortlisting process. The nomination process will, however, be taken out of politicians' hands, and that is a major step forward.

David Kidney: Will there be pre-legislative scrutiny of the draft legislation in due course? Looking ahead to the time when the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council loses its UK devolution work load, will my hon. Friend say something about the sustainability of its remaining work load, which consists of the cases that it takes from some Commonwealth countries? In particular, have those countries said anything about his proposals?

Christopher Leslie: On the latter point, the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council will still be required as long as Commonwealth countries need that final court of appeal to be available for their own legal systems. It is a matter for them whether they wish to use it or end such usage. Recently, for example, New Zealand decided not to continue with that relationship, but to end it. However, we will sustain the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council for those purposes. Pre-legislative scrutiny is not currently part of the proposals. There have been five months of consultation on proposals for the supreme court. The period from the beginning of that consultation to the end of legislative consideration will involve about 18 months-worth of scrutiny. It is important that we look at the details but also make progress as soon as we can.

Douglas Hogg: Does the Minister accept that he is proposing change to an institution that does not require change? In fact, it is working admirably. He has spoken about advancing credibility, improved independence, greater effectiveness and enhanced trust, but does he not understand that the Judicial Committee possesses all those things now, and nothing that he has said will reinforce them? Surely the truth is that we are hearing arguments in favour of change for the sake of change, and are tinkering around with accepted institutions. Such tinkering will increase cost, extend political interference in the choice of senior justices and ultimately bring the system through which we administer the law into disrepute.

Christopher Leslie: I am sorry that the right hon. and learned Gentleman takes that view. Improved independence for our judiciary is a cause well worth striving for, and his considerations about cost should not override that—not that the process would necessarily be costly. There is a need for change, as I have said, and not just because the role of the justices is blurred—are they legislators or they are acting in a judicial capacity? There is currently a self-denying ordinance under which Law Lords cannot speak adequately or vote on particular proposals. If they do so, they disqualify themselves from involvement in certain legal matters. That proves that there is a requirement to act, and we need to do so.

Keith Vaz: I strongly welcome my hon. Friend's statement and the detail that he has given to the House. It must be right that the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State should be involved in the selection process. That is the nature of democratic accountability. However, will my hon. Friend clarify two points? First, will the person chairing the selection panel be judicially qualified. Secondly, my hon. Friend told the House that the Law Lords were aware of the statement, so can he confirm that the Lord Chancellor will meet the Law Lords to discuss the detail that has been given to the House? As he knows, they were split 50:50 in favour of or against the reforms. It is extremely important that they are fully on board in terms of these proposals.

Christopher Leslie: It is important that my noble Friend the Secretary of State and I engage in debate with all involved in Parliament, not least with the Law Lords as they currently work. We shall continue to have that dialogue and ensure that we refine our proposals. It is important that we have the final passage of the recommendation from my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister to the Queen to make the appointment.
	A justice of the supreme court is an important appointment to make and all actions in the name of the Crown need to go through Ministers so that somebody can be accountable to Parliament for that action, even if Ministers are effectively taking the nomination and selection process from a shortlist from an independent appointments commission. It is envisaged that we shall have the president of the supreme court chairing the appointments panel, so I can satisfy my hon. Friend that there will be legal qualification in that respect in overseeing the work that is carried out. I know that we will continue to work together with my hon. Friend to make sure that we scrutinise these proposals as legislation emerges.

Alan Beith: I welcome the fact that the statement addresses a number of concerns that came up in the public evidence sessions that were held by the Constitutional Affairs Committee. May I have some assurance that the more detailed points that the Committee will put in its report tomorrow will be considered carefully in the context of legislation, including our concern about the budget of the supreme court? Will the Minister give an assurance that the Department for Constitutional Affairs, which is effectively an English Department for this purpose, will have no role in the budget of the supreme court? Above all, will the hon. Gentleman listen to the voices of Labour Members as well as Members from other parts of the House who are asking, "Why the rush?" If this is so important, should we not take the necessary time to get it right, by scrutinising legislation in draft and then moving on to do the job properly?

Christopher Leslie: I believe that we are taking the necessary time to get this right. There has been a great deal of consideration, not least from the Select Committee that the right hon. Gentleman chairs, which proves that point. We have had five months of consultation on the document that was published in the summer. I look forward to receiving and reading the report that his Committee will publish tomorrow. The Department for Constitutional Affairs is not just an English Department; it is a UK Department and is capable of being involved in UK issues as well as its devolution responsibilities. I understand the right hon. Gentleman's concern about the budgetary arrangements that we put in place to protect the UK position of the supreme court. In our proposals we want to ensure exactly that. We want a separate accounting arrangement and a separate chief executive and staff who belong to the UK supreme court. We are trying our best to ensure that we satisfy that point.

Clive Soley: My hon. Friend will know that I am a strong supporter of the continuing reform of the British constitution, which is long overdue. Bearing in mind the complexity of the issue, will he tell us a little more about the relationship between the appointments commission and the political process to achieve that? If, as I understand it, between two and five names are to be put forward to the Secretary of State, and then one name to the Prime Minister, will both the Secretary of State and the Prime Minister have any powers other than to accept or reject those names? In other words, is there an opportunity for discussion, or is it simple acceptance or rejection of the process? If that has not yet been considered, can we address that issue in the near future?

Christopher Leslie: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for highlighting a particular point of importance that we shall need to discuss as the legislation progresses. My understanding is that the shortlist from the supreme court's appointments commission of between two and five names is precisely to ensure that the Secretary of State can reflect the need for a wide knowledge of all the jurisdictions on the supreme court in his choice, and a single name will go forward to the Prime Minister and then to Her Majesty. My understanding is that the shortlist will be a final shortlist from the appointments commission, but again we need to consider that as the legislation progresses.

Peter Bottomley: I hope that the Minister will confirm that the only time that we did not have a Lord Chancellor was when the Government decided to interfere with the present arrangements for appeals in the Judicial Committee of the House of Lords.
	Who responded to the Government's consultation with the recommendation that between two and five names should be put forward for a member of the Cabinet to decide which single name should be recommended by the Prime Minister to the Queen?
	Why could the Minister not have held the statement back for at least one day so that the Select Committee's report could have been published in advance of the Government's statement?

Christopher Leslie: We need to ensure that when we have proposals we bring them before Parliament, and that is precisely why I made the statement today.
	The hon. Gentleman goes through some of the history of the office of Lord Chancellor, but to have the Lord Chancellor as the head of the judiciary is unsustainable given the political nature of that appointment—and if hon. Members seriously consider that the Lord Chancellor is not a political figure they have not truly understood the nature of that appointment.
	I think that we had 174 responses to the consultation, and a number of key stakeholders believed that the appointment at this particular level required the involvement of the Prime Minister in making the final proposal to the Queen, and the responses have been published in a document to which the hon. Gentleman has access.

Frank Doran: I welcome my hon. Friend's statement, which I hope will lead us to the correction of a long-standing political and legal anomaly in our system. I particularly welcome the possibility that the supreme court will meet in Edinburgh. That is important, and I hope that that will not be an unusual event when the new court gets under way. As a Scots lawyer no longer in practice, I should say that we take a particular pride in the influence that Scots law has had on the development of English law and the transfer of principles south of the border, and that has usually been done through the House of Lords. The most famous case was that of Donoghue v. Stevens in 1932—one Scots lawyer had to mention it, so I will be the one—which radically reformed the English law on duty of care in contracts, and still influences the law. Will the opportunity for that beneficial flow continue in the new system?

Christopher Leslie: My learned Friend the Member for Lewisham, East (Ms Prentice) informs me that the case to which my hon. Friend refers involved a snail in ginger beer, but I shall look into that case law. I understand and respect his point about the court having the opportunity to sit in places other than London and we do not want to rule that out. It would be for the court to determine where it wanted to sit, but it would be able to sit in Edinburgh.

Alistair Carmichael: Does the Minister recall that in the debate on 16 December I brought to his attention the evidence of Lord Hope of Craighead to the Constitutional Affairs Committee—namely, that what the Government anticipated amounted to an amendment of the Court of Session Act 1988, which is within the provenance of the Scottish Parliament? Has the Minister formed a view on Lord Hope's opinion and, if so, what role does he anticipate there being for the Scottish Parliament in the Bill's passage?

Christopher Leslie: We have not brought forward our own Bill at this stage, so we do not have details about any consequential arrangements, Sewel motions or other legislative requirements in the Scottish Parliament. I am sure that, in consultation with the Scottish Executive, we will be able to ensure that any requirements for legislation are pursued and brought forward. I know that the Scottish Parliament would want to scrutinise the matter to which the hon. Gentleman refers, on which I shall no doubt continue my dialogue with him.

Jim Cunningham: Will my hon. Friend be a little clearer about the housing of the supreme court? Can he tell us how many buildings are on any list that he may have and what he estimates to be the running costs, both in revenue and capital terms?

Christopher Leslie: I want to ensure that the House has an opportunity to look at our proposals, but I know that my hon. Friend will understand that, at this stage, not least given that we are moving forward with legislation shortly, it would be potentially prejudicial to our commercial position if we were to reveal all the different potential sites that we were considering, in case the costs then escalated or, conversely, location opportunities were closed off to us. I hope that he will understand that we do not wish to go into such detail at this stage, but I intend to ensure that we have the opportunity to disclose our preferred location to the House and explore those matters in more detail at the appropriate time.

Edward Garnier: Does the Minister accept my happiness about his acceptance that no criticism of the current Law Lords is implied by his statement? Will he further accept that the proposals are based on a complete misunderstanding of our constitutional history and the theory of the separation of powers? The Law Lords in no sense operate under the shadow of the legislature, but are a useful adjunct to it and gain much from their membership of it. Does he accept that the only result of what is proposed will be a huge and unnecessary additional expense that he has not condescended to detail to us? Would not the millions of pounds that he is bound to have to spend on this exercise be better spent on establishing a purpose-built commercial court that will attract millions of pounds in inward investments from overseas and/or on legal aid?

Christopher Leslie: I know that the hon. and learned Gentleman will be aware in a professional context of many of the requirements for improvement and modernisation throughout the legal system. We are looking at the commercial court arrangement, which is a matter for England and Wales in particular, but I do not believe that he is right to say that we have misunderstood the need for reform of our constitution. I believe that it is an important principle that we should have greater clarity between the different branches of our constitution and allow the judiciary and Parliament to focus on their core roles. That makes for a more effective Parliament and a more effective final court of appeal. The blurring that exists does not give any credence to the idea that we have the justice system for the 21st century that I believe this country deserves.

Ann Cryer: Will my hon. Friend clarify one point? Did he say that, where Commonwealth countries currently use the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council as a final court of appeal, they would be able in future to develop a home-grown variety of that final court of appeal? If that is the case, I shall have some anxieties, as a number of those countries retain the death penalty.

Christopher Leslie: I have to tell my hon. Friend that I do not believe that it is for us to dictate to Commonwealth countries the nature of their justice system. If they choose to retain the final right of appeal to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, that is their right, but if they choose to move away from that arrangement, we should also respect that decision. I believe that that is the correct position to take, and I hope that she will understand that.

Eric Forth: Although I am broadly sympathetic to the Minister's argument for the concept of a separation of powers, may I ask him to reconsider the need for a written constitution at this stage, not only to protect us against the depredations of Governments with large majorities, but to clarify the relationship between our judicial system and his proposed supreme court, and, for example, the European Court of Justice? I should be grateful if he would say another word about how he believes that relationship will develop. Furthermore, given his proposal that there should be an age limit of 70 for supreme court justices, does he see any read-across to Members of Parliament in that regard, and if not, why not?

Christopher Leslie: One reform at a time, Madam Deputy Speaker—[Interruption.] We have no proposals on that matter. The age limit of 70 reflects as closely as we can the current arrangements on the Appellate Committee, and our proposals make good sense. We do not propose to have a written constitution at this stage, but the package of reforms and changes that we are putting before the House is sufficiently ambitious and wide ranging to give the right hon. Gentleman plenty to consider. This Parliament is sovereign on all matters. We choose to delegate some of our legislative considerations to European bodies and elsewhere, but, again, we do not propose any change to the relationship between our highest court of appeal and the European Court of Justice.

Michael Weir: Despite the comment of the hon. Member for Aberdeen, Central (Mr. Doran), the House of Lords has not always had a beneficial effect on Scots law. I refer him to the case of Bartonshall Coal Company v. Reid and its effect on workmen's compensation—[Interruption.] Look it up; it would interest Labour Members. Given that the Minister said that the new supreme court would deal only with Scottish civil appeals and that such appeals will be binding only in Scotland, what is the sense in having these heard in London? Is not the logic of the proposal that Scots law should be repatriated to Scotland, where it belongs? If the Minister goes ahead with this crazy scheme, will he at least assure us that any Scots appeal will be dealt with only by justices who have a thorough knowledge of Scots law, so that we do not get a repetition of the Reid case?

Christopher Leslie: While Scotland remains a part of the UK, those civil appeals should continue to go to the UK supreme court. I do not believe that it would be right to change that.

Alex Salmond: Why not?

Christopher Leslie: Having that appeal to the UK supreme court can be of benefit to the whole of the UK—even in Scottish civil cases—because we all have opportunities to learn from the interpretations and applications made by those justices.

Point of Order

Alex Salmond: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. We read in the Scottish press this morning that the Secretary of State for Scotland is about to announce the acceleration of an all-party commission to investigate the various electoral systems in Scotland. Given Mr. Speaker's many strictures on such matters, would it not be usual to have the consultation and then the announcement in Parliament, as opposed to having the announcement in the press and then the consultation?

Madam Deputy Speaker: That is not a point of order for the Chair. We are about to begin the main business of the day.
	Orders of the Day

Scottish Parliament (Constituencies) Bill

[Relevant document: The First Report from the Scottish Affairs Committee, Session 2003–04, HC 77, on the Coincidence of Parliamentary Constituency Boundaries in Scotland and the Consequences of Change.]
	Order for Second Reading read.

Alistair Darling: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
	The Bill is short and to the point. It will keep the composition of the Scottish Parliament at 129 Members by removing the link in the Scotland Act 1998 that makes the constituencies of the Scottish Parliament the same as those for Westminster. The Bill will also provide for the separate review of the Scottish Parliament constituencies and regions by the Electoral Commission, which takes over the responsibilities of the boundary commission after the completion of the current review cycle. Without these provisions, there would be no mechanism for reviewing the boundaries for the Scottish Parliament constituencies.
	I also want to set out my proposals for dealing with the difficulties that many people believe will arise from having four different voting systems in Scotland, and other associated matters. I shall return to that in a moment, but first let me set out why this Bill is necessary.

Eric Forth: I hope that at some point the Secretary of State will touch on the relationship between Members of the Scottish Parliament and Scottish MPs. If we are to have a large number of MSPs doing all the—no doubt excellent—work that they do at local and constituency level, will he have something to say about the reduction in the responsibilities of Scottish MPs—to say nothing of their allowances—in this House? With all these additional politicians in the Scottish Parliament, how can we justify the continued activity of Scottish MPs, apparently on the same basis as their English and Welsh counterparts?

Alistair Darling: I shall have something to say about MPs and MSPs. The other matter that the right hon. Gentleman raises is for this House, not for the Government.
	The Government accepted from the outset that devolution removed the need for special consideration for Scotland in terms of representation in this House, and that there should be the same electoral quotas for Scotland as for England. That was an integral part of the devolution agreement. Section 86 of the Scotland Act 1998 provided for that reduction in MP numbers, but the Act also made the constituencies of the Scottish Parliament the same as those for Westminster, with the exception of Orkney and Shetland.

Martin O'Neill: My right hon. Friend was in the House during the passage of the Scotland Act. Did he envisage—I certainly did not—that there would be an increase of some 250 per cent. in Scottish representation as a consequence of devolution? That is what one gets if one adds together 59 and 129 and compares it with what we had before.

Alistair Darling: As my hon. Friend knows, when these matters were originally debated it was envisaged that the number of Members of the Scottish Parliament would reduce as and when the number of MPs being sent to Westminster reduced. As I was about to say, however, the Government said at the time that they would consider how the Scottish Parliament was working and keep the matter under review. Indeed, the Government were not the only people who said that. I note that although the Conservatives tabled an amendment—which, sadly, Mr. Speaker was unable to select—the right hon. and learned Member for Devizes (Mr. Ancram), who still speaks for the Conservative party, at least on foreign affairs, said on 12 January 1998:
	"it cannot be good for Scotland to find that, within a year or two of the Scottish Parliament getting going, its numbers are cut to reflect the changes in the number of Scottish Members at Westminster. It makes little sense to set up a Parliament, ask it to bed down and then make fundamental changes to its size and composition."—[Official Report, 12 January 1998; Vol. 304, c. 43.]
	So it was not only members of the Government who took the view that these matters would have to be kept under review; it was the view of Conservative Members, too. That may explain why the right hon. and learned Member for Devizes does not have his name on the Conservative amendment.
	The answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Ochil (Mr. O'Neill) is that when the Scotland Bill was going through the House, it was anticipated that there would be a reduction in the number of MSPs to match the reduction in the number of MPs being sent to Westminster—but my noble Friend Lord Sewel made it clear that the Government would keep the matter under review. They did so, and subsequently consulted. The conclusion, which was announced by the former Secretary of State for Scotland, my right hon. Friend the Member for Airdrie and Shotts (Mrs. Lidell), was that the Government would legislate to keep 129 Members of the Scottish Parliament.

Alex Salmond: Rather than relying on who said what to whom, surely the most convincing illustration of the situation is the question that if it was envisaged—or at least, if it was a strong probability—that the Parliament would keep 129 Members, would not the late Donald Dewar have accepted a design for a Parliament with 129 rooms for MSPs?

Alistair Darling: I should have thought that most Members of this House would be more than happy to leave the accommodation arrangements at Holyrood to those at the Scottish Parliament charged with the responsibility of overseeing the project.

Peter Duncan: The right hon. Gentleman referred to remarks by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Devizes. He may recognise this comment, too:
	"we also believe that the Parliament could operate efficiently with fewer Members, and that there are good arguments for maintaining the linkage in constituencies."—[Official Report, 12 May 1998; Vol. 312, c. 224.]
	Those are the words of the former First Minister, Henry McLeish.

Alistair Darling: I recognise the words of the former First Minister. However, may I remind my hon. Friend the Member for Ochil that when the Scotland Bill was considered, it was envisaged that the number of Members of the Scottish Parliament would reduce as the number of Members of Parliament went down. Indeed, the legislation provided for that. However, we said at the time that we would keep the matter under review. We have done that, and the consensus of opinion—I know that the feeling is not universal—is that the number of Members of the Scottish Parliament should remain at 129.

Bill Tynan: Will my right hon. Friend give way?

Alistair Darling: I should like to make some progress, or we shall never reach the exciting bit, but I shall give way to my hon. Friend.

Bill Tynan: I thank my right hon. Friend. There seems to be some confusion about the number of offices in the Scottish Parliament. I understand that Reid's Close has 105 MSP offices, and that Queensberry House, for the Presiding Officer and two deputies, makes the total 108. Is that not the case?

Alistair Darling: I have no idea about the accommodation arrangements at Holyrood. Although it is currently in my constituency—the boundary commission has made sure that that will not remain the case for much longer—I have not yet had the pleasure of a guided tour of the building. Perhaps I shall one day.

Andrew Turner: Will the Secretary of State give way?

Alistair Darling: I must make some progress. If the hon. Gentleman wants to ask about the accommodation arrangements in Holyrood, he would do better to direct his inquiries to the Scottish Parliament.
	As hon. Members know, the boundary commission recently finished reviewing Scottish Westminster constituencies and it recommends reducing the number to 59. The next stage would be for the commission to consider the boundaries of the regions that return additional Members to the Scottish Parliament. That work must be either concluded or made unnecessary by the Bill before the commission can report to me. The commission is considering the best way to proceed in the light of the Bill's progress.
	The commission is required by statute to report by December 2006. When it does so is a matter solely for the commission itself, but in the light of its progress so far, the review is likely to be finished long before the deadline.

Pete Wishart: I wrote to the Secretary of State about that matter a couple of weeks ago. Does he envisage any circumstances in which we might not contest the next general election under new boundaries?

Alistair Darling: I am sorry, but I did not pick up the hon. Gentleman's question.

Pete Wishart: It is an important question for the Secretary of State. Can he imagine any possibility of not fighting the next general election with the new constituencies? Will we definitely fight the next election under new boundaries?

Alistair Darling: If there were a general election tomorrow morning, we would probably fight it on the existing boundaries. However, as I have said on many occasions, the boundary commission has finished all its work on the Westminster constituencies. It would logically consider the consequential effect on the regions that provide the additional MSPs. The commission is well aware of the Bill and it is currently deciding how best to proceed. The Prime Minister and I have often said that as soon as we get the report—the timing is a matter for the boundary commission—we shall implement it. I cannot make that any clearer.

John Robertson: Will my right hon. Friend clarify the position—[Laughter.] Will he clarify it so that I can understand it? Will the commission start its deliberations on the Scottish Parliament boundaries immediately? Will that mean that its recommendations will be implemented by 2007?

Alistair Darling: Perhaps I have misunderstood my hon. Friend, but I believe that he is confusing two separate matters. As all hon. Members know, the boundary commission, which considers the boundaries for Westminster constituencies, has finished its work on that. Under current legislation, which the Bill would change, the boundary commission would consider the boundaries that govern the return of the additional MSPs. The Bill specifically stops that work because first, we want to maintain the 129 MSPs, and secondly, as I am about to say if I get that far—I propose that we should consider the consequences of having four different systems in Scotland. The commission that I propose to establish to examine that, is different from the boundary commission.

Andrew Turner: Will the Secretary of State give way?

Alistair Darling: No. That is hard on the hon. Gentleman, and I promise that I shall let him in before I finish, but not yet.
	As I said, following the consultation, the former Secretary of State for Scotland, my right hon. Friend the Member for Airdrie and Shotts, told the House on 18 December 2002 that the Government intended to bring forward legislation to retain the existing number of MSPs, and that legislation is now before the House. We are aware of concerns about the future operation of different boundaries for Westminster and Holyrood constituencies. They have been raised on many occasions in this House and elsewhere. We therefore welcome the report published on 3 February by the Scottish Affairs Committee on the possible impact of non-coterminous boundaries on voters, party organisations, electoral administrators and others.
	Hon. Members will recall that my right hon. Friend announced in December 2002 her intention regarding a commission to look at issues arising from the idea of different Holyrood and Westminster boundaries. At that time, she proposed an independent commission to be set up after the Scottish Parliament elections in 2007 to consider the impact of having non-coterminous boundaries for Holyrood and Westminster constituencies. It was also indicated that the commission would not be precluded from looking at questions of electoral systems, including proportional representation.
	I have come to the view that we need to consider such questions not in 2007 but this year. I shall inform the House how I intend to take this matter forward, taking account of some significant changes that have occurred following the Scottish Parliament election last May. As the House will know, the Scottish Parliament is currently considering legislation that, if enacted, would lead to councils in Scotland being elected by the single transferable vote from 2007. Therefore, Scotland now faces the prospect of four different voting systems for an electorate of just over 3.8 million: for UK general elections, the first-past-the-post system; for European elections, a PR list system; for Holyrood, the additional member system; and, if the legislation goes through, STV for local government. In addition, the further complication exists that local government elections in Scotland are expected to take place on the same day as the Holyrood election.

Helen Liddell: I very much welcome the fact that the Secretary of State is bringing forward the independent commission. He makes an important point about the multiplicity of electoral systems that might exist in Scotland. We should all have learned from the May election the lesson that it is important to engage the electorate. Would my right hon. Friend therefore be prepared to raise with the First Minister the possibility that the new independent commission might also consider the electoral system for local government? If we have 129 Members of the Scottish Parliament and 59 Members of the Westminster Parliament, the boundaries should be coterminous. We need to look at how the electoral system operates to make sure that we have a coherent whole.

Alistair Darling: First, I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for her welcome for the announcement that I am in the process of making. Secondly, I shall explain when I set out the terms of reference and the areas to be covered by the commission how local government would be included. In my view, however, the commission needs to be able to look at all the matters that are giving rise to the difficulties that I have set out. Of course, it is for the Scottish Parliament to legislate for local government, just as it is for this Parliament to legislate in relation to the elections to the Scottish Parliament.
	As many of my right hon. and hon. Friends have said, the potential for significant confusion among voters is high as a result of us having four different systems. As the low turnout of voters at the May elections last year suggests, we ought to try to do all that we can to make voting more straightforward and understandable for the electorate, not more complicated. Indeed, since the Scottish Parliament elections last year, debate has been growing in Scotland on the subject of the electoral arrangements for the Scottish Parliament.
	I have also considered the concerns raised about the divergence of boundaries for Westminster and Scottish Parliament constituencies, which will arise from the passage of the Bill before the House and the reduction in the number of Scottish MPs. There may also be scope for further confusion among the public as to their representation in such a circumstance—which, of course, was the conclusion of the Scottish Affairs Committee. That Committee further commented on the difficulties in relations between elected Members, the electorate and other bodies, such as local authorities, because of the sometimes overlapping responsibilities of constituency and list Members of the Scottish Parliament.
	I think that, so that we can deal with all those aspects of possible confusion in our systems of election and representation, the establishment of the commission should be brought forward, and it should start work as soon as possible. It will examine the consequences of having four different voting systems in Scotland, and different boundaries between Westminster and Holyrood. It will consider the implications for voter participation, the relationship between public bodies and authorities in Scotland and MPs and MSPs, and the representation of constituents by different tiers of elected members. It will be asked to make representations on whether the consequences require action to be taken in respect of arrangements between elected representatives, to ensure that constituents and organisations receive the best possible service; the pattern of electoral boundaries in Scotland; the relationship with other public bodies and authorities in Scotland; and the method of voting in Scottish parliamentary elections.
	The commission will be independent. It will consider the case for change, and make recommendations to me and to the First Minister. I intend to discuss the chairmanship and membership of the commission with the other political parties in the House, and I will announce its membership in due course.

Several hon. Members: rose—

Alistair Darling: I will give way to everyone with pleasure, but I give way first to my hon. Friend the Member for Motherwell and Wishaw (Mr. Roy).

Frank Roy: I welcome the establishment of an independent commission, but will it come up with recommendations or with what I am sure many Members would favour—various options?

Alistair Darling: I expect it to make recommendations, but it might recommend the adoption of one of two possible courses. I do not want to fetter its discretion before it even gets going. It may produce a firm recommendation, having reached a conclusive view, or it may say "You could do such and such, or something else." I do not want to say at the very beginning that it must come up with a definite conclusion.
	There is an important point here. As I have said before, if we are to change the way in which the Scottish Parliament is elected, a degree of consensus is needed. Unanimity will never be possible, but this is not something that a single political party can do.
	The commission may produce a recommendation, or a series of recommendations, but it should be remembered that it is for us in this Parliament to decide which—if any—to accept, just as it is for the Scottish Parliament to make decisions relating to local government.

Several hon. Members: rose—

Alistair Darling: I will give way to everyone in due course, but I want to be as fair as possible. I give way to the spokesman for the Liberal Democrats.

Malcolm Bruce: I welcome what the Secretary of State has said about consensus, and I recognise the value of the commission, but will the right hon. Gentleman acknowledge, without binding it in any way, that the settlement that created the Scottish Parliament was endorsed in a referendum on the basis of the principle that the Parliament would be elected under a system of proportional representation? That was a done deal with the Scottish people. Does the right hon. Gentleman accept that the recommendations of the Scottish Affairs Committee, for instance, are totally inconsistent with that principle endorsed by the Scottish electorate?

Alistair Darling: It is open to the commission to consider the Select Committee's recommendations—along with, I dare say, many other representations. As for the hon. Gentleman's general point, it is true that the broad devolution settlement was agreed after a referendum. As I have always said, and as I said a moment ago, there must be a degree of consensus throughout Scotland. This is not just the province of political parties in Scotland; it is a matter for the public—the electorate—in Scotland. I repeat that I do not want to fetter the commission's discretion before it even gets going. It would be best for it to reach its own conclusions.

Brian H Donohoe: Can the Secretary of State give us some idea of the time scale he envisages? As it is nearly two years since we began to discuss the whole question of the 129 seats, would it not be sensible to complete the process sooner rather than later?

Alistair Darling: I agree. My view is that if we are to look at these issues, it should be done quickly. We should come to a conclusion as quickly as possible, consistent of course with having a proper examination of the views—

Andrew Turner: Will the Secretary of State give way?

Alistair Darling: I will give way to the hon. Gentleman in due course.
	Although devolution is of importance in Scotland and electoral systems are of great importance to some and, I suppose, of general importance to us all, I come from the school of thought that believes that no purpose is being served by keeping the process going year after year after year. I thus have a lot of sympathy with the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Cunninghame, South (Mr. Donohoe). An inquiry should be set up, with time to consider the options open to it; it should report and then we should decide what to do.

David Hamilton: rose—

Alistair Darling: In the interests of balance, I shall give way to the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr. Turner) and then to my hon. Friend.

Andrew Turner: The Secretary of State has referred twice to consensus, but on the second occasion he qualified his remarks by saying that it had to be consensus across Scotland. However, we are discussing United Kingdom legislation and it is certainly the consensus in my constituency that one Member of Parliament can serve 100,000 people. Why have my constituents not been asked for their view on this consensus, and why is it necessary for Scots to be served at the rate of one Member of Parliament per 20,000 people?

Alistair Darling: With respect, the hon. Gentleman's question seems to flow from a misunderstanding of the constitutional arrangements in this country. We determine what the consensus is through Parliament—through the House of Commons. We all have a vote on these matters. When proposals eventually come before the House, we all have to decide whether to vote. On the general point about the size of the hon. Gentleman's constituency, I have already said that, as a result of the Scotland Act 1998, the same electoral quota as currently applies in England is now being applied in Scotland through the work of the Scottish Parliament. That point is already being dealt with.

David Hamilton: When the last review took place I was a member of the public and voted on the establishment of a Scottish Parliament, not on the detail of how the election would be held. May I bring my right hon. Friend back to the question put by my hon. Friend the Member for Cunninghame, South (Mr. Donohoe)? When the recommendations are made, which will, I hope, be sooner rather than later—they should be made quickly—we should talk not about recommendations but about the alternatives available to us. It is for us to make the decisions, not the professionals who make recommendations to us. That is extremely important; there should be alternatives, not recommendations.

Alistair Darling: It will always be a matter for the House of Commons to decide which recommendations, or parts of recommendations, it wants to pursue. That is well understood. The point that I was making to my hon. Friend the Member for Cunninghame, South is that it would be wrong for me to say at the very start of the process, "Here's an independent commission, but by the way this is what I want you to conclude", or to say that the commission should offer only us alternatives. A commission might set out a range of options—either because it could not come to a unanimous view or because it felt that some things should be considered further by the House or the Scottish Parliament. I do not know what the commission will decide, but I must tell my hon. Friend the Member for Midlothian (David Hamilton) and other Members that I think it is the best way for us to look at the present electoral arrangements in Scotland, as well as those planned for 2007, so that we can then consider the best option in the future.

Alex Salmond: In the interests of consensus, I welcome the consultation process. However, a few seconds ago, the Secretary of State said that the commission would report to him and the First Minister. Is not there a strong argument that such a commission should be established by the Scottish Parliament and, given the fact that the current electoral system, which so many Labour MPs find so distasteful, was actually voted for in the House, would not it be far better to let the Scottish Parliament have a go to see whether it can find a better electoral system, as its politicians are the ones most immediately concerned?

Alistair Darling: No, I disagree. The way in which Members of the Scottish Parliament are elected is reserved to Westminster; it is an integral part of the devolution settlement. The hon. Gentleman is a nationalist—he is a separatist, so of course he does not agree with that. However, the Labour party is not separatist—we are a party of the Union. We believe in the devolution settlement, and that is not up for grabs.

Frank Roy: I understand the Secretary of State's argument, but my point is that he does not know that the commission will not come back with just one recommendation. I would like my right hon. Friend to ask the commission expressly to come back with various alternatives. As I said, there is nothing to stop the commission providing just a single recommendation. Frankly, that is not enough.

Alistair Darling: I understand my hon. Friend's point, but if we are to set up an independent commission, it is important that we do not end up with a position where, right from the start, we steer it in a direction in which it might not want to go. For all I know, the commission might provide a range of options—

Frank Roy: Or one.

Alistair Darling: It might come up, as my hon. Friend says, with one option, but we must remember that the Government of the day, the House and Parliament as a whole have a perfect right to accept all, none or only parts of the recommendations.
	In setting out this course of action, I have consulted the First Minister, who shares my concerns and welcomes taking the debate forward. I want to make it clear that I have an open mind on these matters and that we should not pre-judge the conclusions, although, as I said earlier, the outcome must respect the basic principles of the devolution settlement.
	I reiterate that the interests of the electorate and the ease and effectiveness with which they exercise their democratic rights are paramount in all those matters. I have also made it clear that any future decision to change the present electoral arrangements should try to reflect a consensus within Scotland. The commission will therefore be expected to carry out its remit through wide-ranging consultation designed to achieve general support for any change. There will never be unanimity, but the system of election to the Scottish Parliament does need broad agreement. It is our responsibility to provide the basis for a debate on electoral arrangements for that Parliament because the matter is reserved to Westminster.

Brian Wilson: I am listening carefully to right hon. Friend, but will he confirm my interpretation that he is proposing to set up a commission in order to sort out a confusion that we are still in the process of creating today?

Alistair Darling: No, I would not agree with my hon. Friend. We are trying to resolve the difficulties arising from the fact that, by 2007—assuming that the legislation to set up local government elections is passed—we will have four different systems for electing various people in Scotland, which has an electorate of 3.8 million. That needs to be resolved and that is why I am setting up a commission. It would have been possible for the Government to propose a particular solution, but I believe that we need a consensus—inasmuch as it is possible to secure one—to ensure that the system is generally acceptable in Scotland.

Martin O'Neill: Can my right hon. Friend tell us more about the sequence? The Bill is going through Parliament and will deal with the number of seats. Is the commission not in any way related to the functions or purposes of the Bill, or will it feed into some part of the parliamentary procedures? Will it result in legislation that is wholly separate from the legislation before us today? Frankly, I do not understand the timetable of what my right hon. Friend is talking about. Would it not be more sensible to withdraw the legislation and let the commission deal with the problem, so that we could then come back and deal with its recommendations?

Alistair Darling: I shall have to disappoint my hon. Friend on that. We said two years ago that we intended to introduce legislation to retain 129 Members of the Scottish Parliament. We promised to do that and the Bill to achieve it is now before the House. It is being dealt with separately from the issues considered by the commission.
	I set up the commission because I am well aware that both within and outside political parties in Scotland there is concern about the number of different voting systems and the problems thrown up by the lack of coterminosity between Westminster and Holyrood. That is why a commission is being established, but its timetable is different from the timetable for the Bill. The intention is that the Bill, providing it gains the support of the House and the other place, will be on the statute book by the summer. We promised that we would do that, and going back on that promise would be to invite allegations of bad faith. The commission, as I explained, is operating on a different time scale.

Mohammad Sarwar: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the four different voting systems in Scotland for councils and Scottish, Westminster and European Parliaments will cause confusion among the electorate and encourage voter apathy in all elections? I understand that the commission may consider whether it is impossible for the Scottish and Westminster Parliaments to have the same system, but we should at least have the same system for local government in Scotland and for the Scottish Parliament.

Alistair Darling: My hon. Friend is right to suggest that the commission will consider the arrangements for elections in Scotland—those for the Scottish Parliament and those in relation to local government—and I agree that there is some confusion. All of us who voted last May will recall seeing people who were confused about how the list system worked. Indeed, at the polling station that I was in, an old lady asked for advice from the polling clerk, who looked at me and said, "Not while he's here." [Laughter.]
	We also need to consider the clarity of outcome. It is curious that everyone who stood in some elections got elected one way or another under the present system, and some voters find that difficult to understand—although many hon. Members might quite like such a system if we got elected regardless of what we did. My hon. Friend is right. Indeed, the Select Committee on Scottish Affairs, of which he is a member, considered those matters and believed that such confusion needed to be looked at.

Eric Forth: Following the point made by the hon. Member for Ochil (Mr. O'Neill) and others, will the Secretary of State in the end use his huge majority of English MPs to stampede legislation through the House that affects Scotland?

Alistair Darling: I am glad that the right hon. Gentleman anticipates that we will have a huge majority for some time to come.

Russell Brown: I return to the Select Committee's excellent report, which states:
	"The Committee expects the Electoral Commission to produce its detailed proposals in time for the election to the Scottish Parliament in 2007 to be conducted under the new arrangements. It is, therefore, imperative that the Commission starts its work without delay"—
	as my right hon. Friend is saying—
	"and that it presents its findings to the Secretary of State for Scotland who should take the final decision based on all available information."
	Does my right hon. Friend think it is possible for the new arrangements to be implemented at the next Scottish Parliament election in 2007?

Alistair Darling: As I said in relation to an earlier question, I want the commission to be set up as quickly as possible and then to report as soon as it can, subject to having adequate time to consider such things. Thereafter, assuming that it recommends some form of change, primary legislation will be necessary. For obvious reasons, I cannot say when the Government might introduce such legislation, especially as we have not even got any recommendation to do so, but many people will take the view that, having set up the commission, it is best to ask it to get on with its work as quickly as it reasonably can because keeping such matters going for year after year would be unnecessary and not widely acceptable.

Michael Weir: Much has been made of the Select Committee on Scottish Affairs report. I am a member of that Committee. Does the Secretary of State not accept that the defect in the report is that, after calling for a commission, it makes a specific recommendation for a system that many Labour Back Benchers are pushing for? Does he accept that that is wrong and that the commission should be completely independent?

Alistair Darling: The hon. Gentleman is relatively new to the House, but I can assure him that it is not unknown for Select Committees to make recommendations.

Jimmy Hood: I am trying my best to be sympathetic to the difficulties in which the Secretary of State finds himself, but is it not the truth that he is experiencing difficulties because we agreed—he says two years ago, but it may be more—to change the legislation without understanding the consequences of the change? We are now being asked to change the legislation and to rely on a commission of the great and the good to make decisions for us or to make recommendations. That does not point to good governance at all.

Alistair Darling: I do not agree with my hon. Friend. Anyone who considered the matter two years ago when the former Secretary of State made the announcement would have understood full well the import of what was being considered.
	There is a simple point to make about the commission. Although, in theory, it would be open to the Government of the day to say, "Right, this is the voting system. Take it or leave it", I do not think that it would be possible to make a change on something as fundamental as the way in which we elect representatives without there being a degree of consensus. My hon. Friend and I might disagree on that point, but it is important.
	I am not suggesting that a commission is the only way to proceed, but I propose to establish a commission and I have said that I shall talk to party representatives in the House to get it set up as quickly as possible. However, as I have said many times before, there needs to be a debate in Scotland the best way of electing MSPs about and so on. That is the best way to proceed.
	At this stage, I shall briefly go through what is in the Bill.

Eric Forth: Ah.

Alistair Darling: By convention, Secretaries of State do that, but I sense that the mood of the House is for me to do it quite quickly.

Tom Clarke: I think that I have understood everything that my right hon. Friend has said to the House, but one issue is not clear in my mind because it is one for the Scottish Executive. On the proposals for electing councillors to local government, do the Scottish Executive take a firm view or are they prepared to submit proposals on that to the same commission or to arbitration in the way that my right hon. Friend will in respect of matters that are relevant to him?

Alistair Darling: As I said a while ago, the decision about the system for electing councillors in Scotland is entirely a matter for the Scottish Executive. We have no control at all over that. It will be for the Scottish Executive and the Scottish Parliament to decide what course of action they wish to follow. My right hon. Friend will be aware of the agreement between the governing parties in the Scottish Executive in relation to this and it is no part of my statement today to interfere in the working of it. The commission will be set up after discussions with the First Minister and it will consider not just how we elect MSPs, but the implications of the changes proposed for councils. Whether that has implications for what the Scottish Executive are doing is a matter for them and not for me. It would probably be against the spirit of the whole devolution settlement if I were to go any further than that.
	As I have said, the Bill is short and to the point so I can deal with what it does fairly quickly. [Interruption.] Most of my speech has not been about the Bill. Clause 1 will replace the first schedule to the Scotland Act 1998, which makes provision for constituencies. It will keep the size of the Parliament at 129 Members.
	Clause 2 will give effect to the provisions in schedule 3 on the review of Westminster constituencies and the Scottish Parliament regions that is being carried out for the boundary commission for Scotland. Schedule 1 will provide a mechanism for reviewing these boundaries whatever they may be once the Bill is on the statute book.
	Schedule 2 will make transitional provisions to deal with the position before the Electoral Commission takes over, and schedule 3 is important because it ensures that the boundary commission's recommendations in relation to the Scottish regions will no longer be relevant.
	The scope of the Bill is narrow and deliberately so, because its sole aim is to give effect to the Government's promise to retain the current size and structure of the Scottish Parliament. I believe that the commission that I have announced today will deal with a number of concerns that have been raised not just in the House but throughout Scotland, and it will make recommendations on how we elect Members to the Scottish Parliament in future. However, as I have said, the purpose of this Bill is to make provision for retaining 129 MSPs. I commend it to the House.

Alan Duncan: The Secretary of State made it clear—perhaps I should say that he eventually made it clear—that the principal purpose of this short, four-clause Bill is to amend the Scotland Act 1998 to remove the link between constituencies for the Scottish Parliament at Holyrood and constituencies here at Westminster.
	The current position is straightforward and widely understood. Schedule 1 to the 1998 Act contains provisions to reduce MSPs at Holyrood in proportion to any reduction in Scottish seats at Westminster. Under the current legislation, once Westminster constituencies are cut from 72 to 59, MSPs at Holyrood would automatically reduce from 129 to 108.
	Clause 1 fundamentally changes that. It amends schedule 1 to the 1998 Act so that the existing constituencies for the Scottish Parliament remain the same, irrespective of any changes made to parliamentary constituencies for this House. That is set out in paragraphs 1 and 2 of schedule 1, which preserves 73 MSPs within the existing constituencies and 56 list MSPs in eight regions, with seven members per region.
	In addition, the Bill provides that the Electoral Commission will review constituencies and regions for the Scottish Parliament separately from any review of Westminster constituencies. It represents a U-turn by the Labour Government on their previous commitments—put simply, it is undeniable that they have buckled under pressure from their own MSPs. That is why in December 2001 the then Secretary of State for Scotland, the right hon. Member for Airdrie and Shotts (Mrs. Liddell) launched her consultation on whether Westminster and Holyrood constituencies should continue to be linked. That is why, to little surprise on the Conservative Benches, on 18 December 2002 she announced to the House that she had been persuaded that the Scottish Parliament should remain as it is now at 129 MSPs.

Robert Smith: The hon. Gentleman mentions U-turns, but the Bill seeks to undo the U-turn in the 1998 Act from the commitment made by the Labour party in the convention on Scotland that the size of the Scottish Parliament would be appropriate to its functions and not coupled to the reduction in MPs at Westminster. The Bill also helps in that it speeds up the delivery of the reduction in MPs at Westminster by allowing the boundary commission to report on that half of the Government's proposals once it is enacted.

Alan Duncan: There is considerable doubt about whether the number of MSPs is appropriate to the Scottish Parliament's functions.
	To pacify Labour and Liberal MSPs in Edinburgh, the Labour Government say that the 1998 Act must be amended. Having set out the constitutional settlement in detail, they have taken only six years to start tinkering with it. Let me be clear: Conservative Members believe that the Bill is wrong. The Government should uphold the terms of the 1998 Act and, as they originally intended, proportionately reduce MSPs and MPs. In our view—this is the answer to the intervention by the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Sir Robert Smith)—Scotland is already over-governed. It needs fewer politicians, not more. And there is no doubt that the Scottish Parliament could function as well, if not better, with a membership of 108.

Brian H Donohoe: The hon. Gentleman's argument does not take into account the proportionality within the Scottish Parliament and would reduce the numbers in the list system.

Alan Duncan: That is one way of doing it. The argument is whether the constituency boundaries should be coterminous. I am aware of the logical point that the hon. Gentleman is about to make, which I shall address in a moment.

Alex Salmond: I am struck by what the hon. Gentleman just said. The vast majority of MSPs, across a range of political parties—not the Conservatives, but everyone else—agree that 129 Members are necessary for the proper functioning of the Parliament. What exact specialty or knowledge does the hon. Gentleman have to gainsay that argument, given that it is the decided majority view of the majority of MSPs?

Alan Duncan: It is the knowledge that I can spot a self-serving consensus when I see it.
	Let me quote another authoritative source on this issue, who said:
	"We understand the arguments in favour of maintaining the Parliament's size, but we also believe that the Parliament could operate effectively with fewer Members, and that there are good arguments for maintaining the linkage in constituencies."—[Official Report, 12 May 1998; Vol. 312, c. 224.]
	Those are not my words, nor those of any Conservative: they are the considered judgment of none other than the former First Minister for Scotland, Henry McLeish, during the passage of the Scotland Act 1998.
	Conservatives support smaller government and a smaller Parliament, while being firmly committed to making devolution work. As the Scottish Conservative manifesto for the Scottish parliamentary elections in May said:
	"The Scottish Parliament should not be immune from this drive for leaner, fitter government. We will cut the number of MSPs, in line with the reduction in Scottish MPs at Westminster, by implementing the provisions of the Scotland Act."
	But it is not just on those grounds that we oppose the Bill. Nor do we oppose it just on grounds that it is yet another reversal of policy by the Government. It is for many other reasons besides.
	As a consequence of the Bill, if passed, future elections to Holyrood and Westminster would be fought on different constituency boundaries. It has been said that that
	"will cause chaos and confusion".—[Official Report, 18 December 2002; Vol. 396, c. 864.]
	Again, those are not my words, but those of the right hon. Member for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley (Mr. Foulkes). [Hon. Members: "Where is he?"] He is absent from his place today. There may be good reasons for that, as there often are when someone who attends as diligently as he does is not here. In the same debate, the hon. Member for Falkirk, East (Mr. Connarty) called the proposals "an absolute shambles".
	The Bill runs counter to the arguments put by the Government in 1998 when the Scotland Bill was going through this House. As the then Scottish Office Minister and later First Minister, Henry McLeish, said, in rejecting a Liberal Democrat amendment to the Bill:
	"We believe that the integrity of the Union will be strengthened by having common constituencies for the Scottish and United Kingdom Parliaments". —[Official Report, 28 January 1998; Vol. 305, c. 456.]
	We can infer only that the purpose of the Government in introducing a Bill that breaks the link is to weaken the integrity of the Union.

Pete Wishart: In the hon. Gentleman's many travels to Scotland, has he ever come across any members of the Scottish public who have expressed their concerns about coterminosity?

Alan Duncan: I know that there are some great intellectuals in Scotland, because I visit it regularly, as the origins of my name suggest.
	Mr. McLeish also said:
	"Having constituencies that cover the same geographical area will help to encourage liaison between MPs and MSPs in ensuring that the interests of their common electorate are served properly in whichever Parliament is responsible for an issue. Good working relationships between Members of the Scottish Parliament and Westminster will be essential if devolution is to be a success." —[Official Report, 12 May 1998; Vol. 312, c. 224.]
	Last Tuesday, the Scottish Affairs Committee published its report, "Coincidence of Parliamentary Constituency Boundaries in Scotland and the Consequences of Change". Like all Select Committees, the Scottish Affairs Committee has a Labour majority, but even that did not prevent it from highlighting the tremendous tensions that would be created for the electorate by having different constituencies for Holyrood and Westminster. As the Committee concluded, in paragraph 11:
	"The Committee considers the convenience of the electorate to be paramount. Based on the evidence we have received, we recommend that, in order to avoid possible confusion, the constituency boundaries in Scotland for elections to the United Kingdom and to the Scottish Parliament should remain coterminous".
	The reality is that different boundaries for elections to Holyrood and Westminster will create a complete mess. As my hon. Friend the Member for Galloway and Upper Nithsdale (Mr. Duncan) has pointed out, keeping 129 MSPs will simply add to the instability created by such issues as the West Lothian question. We believe that there should be coterminous boundaries, as did the Government in the 1998 Act. We also believe that Holyrood constituencies should be reduced in line with Westminster constituencies. The simple way to achieve that is by upholding the terms of the original legislation.
	There is of course another aspect to this debate, which is the question of Scottish representation in this House.

Michael Weir: If the hon. Gentleman wants simply to reduce the number of seats in the Scottish Parliament, in line with the reduction in seats in this place, from 72 to 59, will he explain whether he proposes to have 59 directly elected MSPs and retain the 56 list MSPs?

Alan Duncan: I suppose that that is what would happen under the 1998 Act. However, let us consider representation in this House.

Brian H Donohoe: rose—

Alan Duncan: Let me just move on. The Government have given several commitments that the reduction in the number of Scottish seats at Westminster from 72 to 59 will take place in time for the next UK general election. The Scotsman reported in July 2003 that the Secretary of State
	"told a private meeting of the Scottish group of Labour MPs there were no plans to postpone the boundary changes which will see the number of Scottish constituencies cut from 72 to 59."
	That followed a commitment given by the Prime Minister—who is struggling to ensure that everything that he says is fully trusted—in response to a question from my hon. Friend the Member for East Devon (Mr. Swire), who voiced the suspicion shared by many that the Government plan to renege on their commitment to reduce the number of Scottish Members of Parliament at Westminster. The Prime Minister replied that
	"we made that commitment clear and we will of course carry it through."—[Official Report, 16 July 2003; Vol. 409, c. 278.]
	Well, will he do that? Perhaps the Secretary of State can repeat that assurance today.
	The Prime Minister made that comment the day before the Leader of the House said that the only commitment was to publish the report by 2006. The Secretary of State said in September that he expected to lay the order implementing the cut "early next year". Where is the order? Will he unequivocally commit to implementing this change according to that timetable, and before the next Westminster election if possible?

Alistair Darling: It is becoming pretty clear that the hon. Gentleman has scant knowledge of Scottish affairs in general. I think that he was in the Chamber when I made my speech, although he was chattering all the time. I said that the boundary commission had completed its work on the Westminster constituencies but not yet submitted its report to me as Secretary of State. As I have made clear on many occasions, and as the Prime Minister has also said, when it submits its report, that report will be implemented; but when it comes to me it is entirely in the hands of the independent boundary commission.

Alan Duncan: If that is known to be the case, it seems very strange that such clear commitments were given in the first place. The Government should know better.
	The Bill will reinforce the balances already created by the problem raised by the West Lothian question, and lead to a cut in the number of Scottish MPs here while maintaining the current number in Scotland. We consider that the Bill is bad for Scotland and bad for the United Kingdom. It reverses the commitments given by the Government in 1998, breaks yet another link between Westminster and Edinburgh and will lead to chaos and confusion across Scotland. I therefore urge the House to vote no today, and to resile from supporting this illogical and unprincipled Bill.
	Several hon. Members rose—

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. May I remind all right hon. and hon. Members that Mr. Speaker has imposed a 15-minute time limit on all Back-Bench speeches?

Irene Adams: This issue seems to excite hon. Members greatly. As has been pointed out, it is not first on the list of complaints at constituency surgeries, but it seems to have exercised us all for the past two years, since it was suggested that 129 Members should remain at Edinburgh.
	We must ask ourselves how we arrived at this point in the first place. We did not come up with the figure of 129 overnight. The subject was debated in Scotland for at least 20 years, and that culminated in our setting up the Scottish Constitutional Convention, in which the Labour party, the Liberal Democrats, the unions and the churches all took part. Unfortunately, the Scottish National party did not, which is understandable given that it supports independence for Scotland, not devolution. The Conservatives, too, refused to take part, but that was not surprising at the time because 10 Scotland Members on the Conservative Front Bench—the Conservative party was then in government—decided everything that happened in Scotland, while 62 Scotland Members sat on the Opposition Benches.
	That is how we reached the current position. The convention came up with 129, but it was not the original number; I think that that was 140 or 144. We made the decision to have 129 Members on an additional list system—so that there would be some proportionality—only after much discussion with the unions, the Liberal Democrats and the churches.

Peter Duncan: Does the hon. Lady accept that the consensus reached was on the balance between proportionally elected top-up Members and constituency Members? Therefore, if the number of constituency Members of the Scottish Parliament were reduced, it would be logical to maintain that proportion and reduce the number of list Members.

Irene Adams: Perhaps if the hon. Gentleman's party had taken part in those discussions, he could have said something on that at the time, but it refused to do so.
	Another subject that raised its head in the search for consensus was gender balance. Some of us thought that the convention had also found agreement on that, but only the Labour party addressed that issue, and it still seems to be the only party that does so. I hope that other hon. Members will tell us why their parties never got to that point.
	The 129 Members were to be made up by the direct election to Edinburgh of one Member per Westminster constituency, with a top-up—[Interruption.]

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. May we have just one debate in the Chamber, please?

Irene Adams: There was then a top-up Member from a list system. Anyone who thinks that that system is working now is living in cloud cuckoo land. One directly elected Member operates surgeries in a given Westminster constituency, followed by, in my constituency, any one of eight list Members. My hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Anniesland (John Robertson) pointed out to the Select Committee that in Glasgow some 77,000 votes were cast for the Labour party in the second ballot, but that not one person was elected with them. I do not know where the fairness in that system lies, given that a member of a minority party could be elected with 10,000 votes. The system clearly is not working.

John Robertson: Does my hon. Friend agree that the more than 77,000 members of the electorate who went to the bother of filling in their ballot papers would have done as well to throw them in a bucket as to take part in the election?

Irene Adams: Many people at the polling stations found it hard to understand how the system worked. The most common question that they asked was what the second vote was for, and what its outcome would be, and they were being told by minority parties, "Don't vote for the majority party or the main opposition party because your vote won't count." There is something wrong with a system in which democrats stand at a polling station and say that to people coming through the doors.

Alex Salmond: I very much agree with the point that the hon. Lady is developing, in that, in my experience, the vast majority of people regard the second vote as a second preference. However, does she concede that there are other list systems and other forms of proportionality that do not depend on having two votes and two ballot papers?

Irene Adams: Absolutely. I concede that that is the case. My point is that this system is probably the worst that we could have chosen at the time—[Interruption.] I give way to the hon. Member for Galloway and Upper Nithsdale (Mr. Duncan).

Peter Duncan: I am sorry; I was not seeking to intervene, but I shall take the opportunity to do so. The hon. Lady must accept that that was her system, decided on under the consensus that came out of the convention. She is seeking to deny the consensus on the one hand and uphold it on the other.

Irene Adams: Indeed I am not denying the consensus. This often happens when there is consensus: everyone gets what no one wants. That is part of the problem with consensus, but it is democratic. It does not always lead to the perfect system, but it gives everyone a little of what they want, although it does not give them all that they want.
	Taking evidence in the Select Committee, we did not find anyone who supported the existing system. Everyone thought that it was not the best way of doing things and that we should look for other ways. The Committee agreed that 129 MSPs should remain at Edinburgh, primarily because most of the Scottish Parliament's committee structures are built around that figure. I am quite happy to accept that. That committee system seems to be working well, even though it has not had a lot of time to bed in, and that is a good enough reason to leave that number as it is.
	The problem that then arises is that we do not have coterminous boundaries. That is not a problem for political parties. It might be a pain in the neck for them, but we can all find ways of managing the situation. I would suggest, however, that it is a great problem for the electors.

Mohammad Sarwar: I understand that the present system for electing MSPs is not perfect, but what is my hon. Friend's preferred option? Would she go for a first-past-the-post system, such as that supported by the Conservatives, and which gave them zero per cent. representation in the 1997 elections? Or would she support the single transferable vote system for local government and the Scottish Parliament?

Irene Adams: There are many ways of doing this, and the Secretary of State is right to put this matter to a commission. The Select Committee said that we should ask a commission to give various options. We also said that there should be two Members in Edinburgh per Westminster constituency, but I do not think that that necessarily has to be done by a first-past-the-post system.

Frank Roy: My hon. Friend has raised an interesting point. She said that the Select Committee hoped that the commission would come back with various options. However, if it comes back with only one recommendation to which the House has to say yes or no, does she see a danger of our having to go back to the very beginning? If we are presented with a number of alternatives, it will broaden the debate and there will be a far better chance of reaching consensus.

Irene Adams: I hope that a commission will take account of what is being said here today when it considers these issues. My main concern about its bringing forward only one recommendation is that it would become a fait accompli, and there would be grave dangers in that. We should be presented with options for achieving two Members per Westminster constituency. It could be achieved through a first-past-the-post system, through an alternative vote system, or by linking two or three Members within each Westminster constituency to give a single transferable vote system. There are many and varied ways of achieving that goal.

David Hamilton: May I put one alternative to my hon. Friend? MSPs also share a frustration in relation to list Members. They have to do all the work, yet at the end of the day these other people parachute in to take the work away from them. The alternative vote system is worthy of consideration because a majority of the electorate in a constituency has to vote for certain candidates. The commission should consider such a system.

Irene Adams: That is why it is important that the commission lays down all the options and tells us what they will achieve. That would give Parliament a real decision to make, and I believe that Governments should make those decisions. That is what Governments are elected to do. They should carry the can if the decision goes wrong, but they are here to do that job.

Helen Liddell: I am following the gist of my hon. Friend's argument. My only anxiety relates to the fankle that we got ourselves into over the reform of the House of Lords, when a raft of different alternatives was put before the House. How would my hon. Friend envisage such a problem being dealt with?

Irene Adams: The Secretary of State would have to deal with the recommendations made by the commission and make some sense of them when presenting them to the House. [Laughter.] I know that he will be delighted by that thought, but that is the way the cookie crumbles. I take the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Midlothian (David Hamilton) that concern has been expressed about list Members muscling in—I believe that that is the phrase that has been used—on directly elected Members' constituencies. This applies to all parties; it is not a party political point. Directly elected Members felt that specific issues were being cherry-picked, and that it was not necessarily the topic of the day that was being picked out but the one that was the most politically favourable. Campaigns were being set up.
	Given the present boundary of my constituency, if we do not have coterminous boundaries, the new constituency will have three directly elected MSPs and eight list MSPs. That means that 11 people will have an interest in that one constituency. The Convention of Scottish Local Authorities told the Committee that it had great difficulty in answering questions coming from the directly elected MSP and also from the list MSPs. It said that it was sometimes asked as many as 600 questions on the same subject. That was causing a great deal of difficulty, and the bureaucracy involved was enormous.

Anne Picking: I am happy to go on record as saying that I support the principle of coterminous boundaries for all elections in constituencies and wards, particularly in Scotland. Does my hon. Friend share my concern that although the Scottish Parliament has the right to introduce any electoral system that it likes for local government, if it does not participate in the work of the commission and listen to what it says, rather than going its own way, there could be a danger of the whole thing falling apart?

Irene Adams: The Scottish Parliament has indicated that it is prepared to participate, and we all welcome that.
	Coterminous boundaries are necessary, mainly for the electorate. They should not matter to us—we should find ways round the issue—but the electorate need the easiest system that we can come up with to enable them to vote. Until now, people have been used to building blocks from one part of the system to the other, in relation to each tier of government. In local government in my constituency, for example, there are 15 council seats and one MSP.

Pete Wishart: In the numerous surgeries that the hon. Lady conducts in her constituency, how many members of the public have come to her and expressed their concern about coterminosity?

Irene Adams: None of them would put it in quite those terms, but they might express the difficulty with having different systems. In fact, the Electoral Commission told us that, after the last Scottish parliamentary elections, it carried out a survey that found that 13 per cent. of those who did not vote did not do so because the system confused them. They honestly did not understand it. If the hon. Gentleman cares to read the Select Committee report, he will find that evidence in it.
	People have been used to building blocks from one tier of democracy to the other. The old regional councils were probably the best example of that. There were five district council seats, three regional council seats and one MP. People understood that; they understood who their directly elected Member was and which tier of government was represented by whom. It is important that we retain that. That is why we considered that there should be two directly elected Members to Edinburgh per Westminster seat. The commission should come up with a way for that to be achieved.

Andrew Turner: The hon. Lady mentioned list Members parachuting into constituencies. I understand that the code of conduct for MSPs requires that they
	"should not misrepresent the basis on which they are elected or the area that they serve".
	Does that mean that list MSPs are not allowed to describe themselves as "the MSP for Paisley, North", in the way that Liberal MEPs in my patch describe themselves as "the MEP for the Isle of Wight"?

Irene Adams: There is a code of conduct, but, unfortunately, it is often broken. I do not know what the Liberals do in the hon. Gentleman's constituency, but some concern has been expressed over such issues.
	I am also concerned that people see MSPs differently under that system. They see directly elected MSPs as having a different role from list MSPs, and I do not like the idea of a two-tier system of MSPs—or MPs, for that matter. That would not be a good way to go. I welcome the commission that has been announced today, but I am a wee bit concerned about commissions taking decisions such as these. As I have said, I believe that it is the job of Governments to take such decisions. I worry that when the commissioners report their findings they will not suit everybody, so people will say they are a whitewash and that they knew that that was what they would say. However, I hope that everyone accepts that a commission is the best way of proceeding. I hope that it will produce a list of options for the Secretary of State, rather than a single proposal that becomes a fait accompli before it ever reaches the House.

John Thurso: There has been considerable debate this afternoon about various electoral systems, which I shall address later in my remarks—but as for the electorate's ability to understand the electoral system, in my constituency of Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross the good electors have no trouble whatsoever understanding the electoral system. In fact, I was extremely taken aback to discover when canvassing for my MSP colleague, Jamie Stone, just how well they understood the system and the tactical voting lengths to which they went to make good use of their second vote.

Frank Roy: If the hon. Gentleman's constituents understood the system so well, what was the turnout?

John Thurso: I cannot remember the exact turnout, but it was approximately 50 per cent.
	I welcome the Bill, which is short and, I hope, sweet. However, I have some reservations. I welcome the Bill for one reason alone.

Mohammad Sarwar: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

John Thurso: If the hon. Gentleman will give me half a chance, I shall give way to him shortly.
	I welcome the Bill because it gives effect to the Government's promise to maintain the number of MSPs in the Scottish Parliament, thereby maintaining the status quo.

Mohammad Sarwar: I accept that the hon. Gentleman advocates proportional representation, because it benefits the Liberal Democrats and the nationalists. However, I am at a loss to explain why he supports having four different voting systems for elections for councils, the Scottish Parliament, Westminster and the European Parliament. I believed that the Liberal Democrats were concerned about different voting systems.

John Thurso: If the hon. Gentleman would be kind enough to let me get past my opening remarks, he would discover that I do not support our having four voting systems. I hope that he will permit me to develop that argument in a moment.
	The current proportional system does not favour the Liberal Democrats. If we do the maths, we can see that other systems are slightly better. However, the critical point is that proportionality benefits the electors, and that is what we should be thinking most about. It was apparent to most of us who were involved in the passage of the Scotland Act 1998 that a drop of almost 20 per cent. in the number of MSPs would almost certainly be unworkable. There were widespread reports at the time that the then Scottish Office and the then Secretary of State for Scotland, Donald Dewar, wished to amend section 86 and other relevant provisions to decouple the Scottish parliamentary constituencies from Westminster constituencies. Indeed, I can confirm that in a private conversation that I had with Donald Dewar after the passage of the Act, he admitted as much.

Alex Salmond: The hon. Gentleman's recollection is exactly the same as mine, because I had exactly the same private conversations. However, the key point that people made was that imposing a number on an unwilling Scottish Parliament would be inconceivable. Does that not demonstrate that this discussion should be repatriated to the Scottish Parliament?

John Thurso: I shall not get into an argument about repatriation, but the hon. Gentleman makes a good point. Whether the matter is dealt with here or in the Scottish Parliament, it is inconceivable that it should be done without consultation and a consensus in Scotland.

John Robertson: As someone who took over Donald Dewar's constituency, and as a friend, I find that people rewrite history only after someone is dead. The rewriting of history never took place when that person was alive. Can the hon. Gentleman explain why those private conversations have suddenly come out, because they did not when the man was alive?

John Thurso: Other people were present when that conversation took place, and after our debate I would be happy to tell the hon. Gentleman to whom he could speak.

Tam Dalyell: It is important to know what Donald Dewar is alleged to have said. What did he actually say?

John Thurso: He gave me the impression that he would prefer the matter to be decoupled and the numbers maintained, but had lost the argument in Cabinet.

Frank Roy: The hon. Gentleman says that Donald Dewar gave him that impression. Does that mean that he said those words, or did the hon. Gentleman just take it that that was what he meant?

John Thurso: That was my understanding of a conversation that took place in 1998—they are not the exact words.
	I should like to make some progress. It comes as no surprise that this matter has required attention, and it is to the Government's credit that they have sought to remedy an obvious error. The Bill has certain merits, and I shall deal with two that strike me. First, it is commendably short—I always like short legislation—and secondly, without question, it does the job that it is intended to do, which is to maintain the status quo at Holyrood. My right hon. and hon. Friends and I therefore welcome it. However, the Government may have missed an opportunity to take a longer look at the way in which the electoral system in Scotland operates, and they could have introduced proposals to address the problem. However, the announcement by the Secretary of State today is extremely helpful, and I welcome his comments. I look forward to reading them in Hansard to make sure that I have understood his announcement.
	It makes sense, however, for an independent commission to look at coterminosity and methods of election as soon as is practicable. I welcome the fact that, as I hope, the commission will begin work this year, and that its membership will be independent. I very much hope that it will stick with two key principles in the work of the Scottish Constitutional Convention—that a broad consensus will be sought, and that the commission will adhere to proportionality in representation. The Secretary of State made it clear in response to an intervention by my hon. Friend the Member for Gordon (Malcolm Bruce) that those two principles would be included in the commission's brief, or guiding principles.
	My hon. Friends and I have long argued for the merits of the single transferable vote, and shall continue to do so. In addition to the obvious merit of being the most proportionate and fair system, it would, if adopted, have the added attraction of mirroring the proposed system for local government in Scotland, and dealing with the issue of coterminosity. However, I shall leave that for today, and look forward to submitting our evidence to the commission.
	The report on the subject by the Scottish Affairs Committee is both timely and germane, and I am glad that we have had an opportunity to see it before the debate. First, it makes it abundantly clear that there is widespread support for maintaining the numbers. The proposal was backed by my party, the Scottish Labour party, the Scottish National party, the Scottish Parliament and the Executive, which is as broad a consensus as is possible in politics. The reason for that broad consensus is simple—it is the experience of the Scottish Parliament in action, particularly the Committee system, which everyone agrees has worked extremely well, and simply could not function satisfactorily with many fewer Members.

Andrew Turner: Will the hon. Gentleman explain, for the benefit of my constituents, why 100,000 Scots electors need five Members of Parliaments—and I mean Parliaments, in the plural—to represent them, whereas the constituents of the Isle of Wight need only one? [Interruption.] I know that that question has been asked before, but we did not get an answer.

John Thurso: I will leave the explanation to the hon. Gentleman's constituents to him. If I were in his seat, I would be looking to have proper representation for England. He should be asking why should the people of England have less representation than the people of Scotland, not saying that English Members are disadvantaged compared with those in Scotland. That is the answer to the West Lothian question, as we said in the debate on that question in the Chamber not long ago.
	As the hon. Gentleman and others have observed, there was only one exception to the broad consensus that existed in Scotland, and that was the Scottish Conservative party, which wished the relevant provision in the current Act to remain in force. The Conservatives have made an amazing U-turn. They argued throughout the passage of the Scotland Bill in this House and the other place that the proposed reduction in numbers was wrong. One of my abiding memories from having been in another place is of watching Lord Sewel as he gamely attempted to fend off the penetrating arguments of Lord Mackay of Ardbrecknish, who, sadly, is no longer with us. Lord Sewel may have rebutted Lord Mackay's arguments in that way because he was not particularly convinced of the arguments that he was trying to advance at the time.
	Out of interest, I referred to the House of Lords Hansard for 22 October 1998. After a long, cogent, well argued and structured speech comprehensively debunking the idea of reducing numbers, Lord Mackay said in summation:
	"Therefore, I cannot think of anything dafter for the Government to do than to say to this parliament, 'You can start off with 129 members, but when the House of Commons inevitably reduces that number to about 58 Scottish members . . . your numbers will be reduced in a similar manner—'".
	He added:
	"I hope that the Government are going to listen and amend the Bill accordingly because nothing short of that will do."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 22 October 1998; Vol. 593, c. 1600.]
	What has changed?

Alistair Carmichael: Perhaps the rationale behind the Conservative position now—and then—is that whenever it sees change proposed, and whatever that change is to be, it is against it.

John Thurso: I think that my hon. Friend is trying to say that the Conservatives are a tad opportunistic.
	Lord Mackay and I disagreed on many things in politics, but on the occasion to which I have referred we were in accord. Later, when I moved an amendment to deal with the anomaly, I was delighted to see that all the Conservative Members of the other place followed me into the Lobby to support it. It was duly passed in another place. I regret that we were unable to achieve the same feat in this place, and it was duly removed by this House.
	As I have said, I often disagreed with Lord Mackay, but I respected him both as a man and a parliamentarian. I believe that he was right in October 1998, and that nothing has changed except the current Scottish Conservative party, which seems hellbent on swapping obscurity for lunacy.

Jim Sheridan: On a couple of occasions the hon. Gentleman has mentioned friends and colleagues who are no longer with us. In the wake of the private conversations that he had with them, did either of them ever mention the hokey-cokey politicians who cannot make up their minds whether they will stay in this Parliament or in the Scottish Parliament?

John Thurso: Everything that I have quoted from Lord Mackay is in Hansard. As for the hokey-cokey, I remember that you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, said that as long as you were in the Chair there would be no hokey-cokey in this Chamber. I think we will leave it at that.
	There clearly is nothing dafter than maintaining the reduction, and the Government are right to have addressed that point.

Jacqui Lait: The hon. Gentleman has been having a little bit of fun about the Conservative party's position now compared with its stance during the passage of the Scotland Bill. He should acknowledge that Lord Mackay in the House of Lords and my hon. Friend the Member for Woodspring (Dr. Fox) in the House of Commons both made the point that the numbers should be reduced in the Scotland Bill—that is, that the Bill, as it went through Parliament, was wrong.

John Thurso: The hon. Lady is right, inasmuch as the noble Lord argued that whatever numbers we started off with, we should continue with them. I think that if Lord Mackay were here today he would maintain that position. Undoubtedly he would have preferred to start with 108. However, given the choice of 129 reducing to 108 or 129 continuing, he made it clear that he wanted to stay with the 129.
	The Scottish Affairs Committee's report deals with coterminosity. All the evidence clearly shows that coterminosity is highly desirable, particularly for political organisers. It is also extremely convenient for the electors. In the short term, the status quo envisaged in the Bill is therefore the lesser of two evils, but in the longer term it must be right and desirable to achieve conterminous boundaries.
	There is clearly far less consensus on voting systems, as has been evidenced this afternoon. The recommendation of the Committee, while clearly interesting and deserving of serious consideration, does not, in my opinion, maintain the concept of proportionality. However, I can see how that might be varied. As the proposal is currently written, four voting systems would still be involved. I suspect—perhaps the remarks made this afternoon confirm this—that the Committee's attention was more focused on reducing the interference that it perceives from this place than on what might be the best voting system.
	I have already welcomed the Secretary of State's announcement bringing forward the review. I will leave it at that on electoral systems, because, like my right hon. and hon. Friends, I look forward to advancing the argument for the single transferable vote when the commission starts its work.
	The Conservatives have tabled an amendment that a short while ago their colleagues would, as I have recounted to the House, have described as daft. Of all the opportunistic mumbo jumbo that has emanated from the Opposition Dispatch Box, this one takes the biscuit. We are invited to oppose the Bill, despite the support for it in all other quarters, because it is said not to address the proliferation of politicians in Scotland. What proliferation? What are we talking about? We are talking about either maintaining the status quo—that can hardly be described as a proliferation—or reducing the number by about 21 persons. How many politicians are there in Scotland, even with us, local councillors and MSPs? There must be 1,000 or more. If a reduction of 21 in 1,000 is a proliferation, I fail to see the logic.

Peter Duncan: I know that the hon. Gentleman has a vigorous campaign of surgeries in his constituency. If he were to ask people attending those surgeries whether there were too many politicians in Scotland or too few, what does he think most of them would say?

John Thurso: Most of my constituents would simply like to get something done by the politician to whom they are speaking—and I have never concerned myself about the Conservative list MSPs who parachute in from time to time.
	The proliferation that the Conservatives choose to talk about is inexplicable, unless they are seeking to sabotage the devolution settlement and go back to the days before there was a Scottish Parliament. The amendment that they tabled makes no sense. Either the Conservative party still does not accept devolution or the amendment is illogical.
	The Bill is short. It is, I hope, an interim measure before moving on to sunnier pastures, and I hope that that period will be short and sweet. It does not go quite as far as my right hon. and hon. Friends and I would like, but it does the job and starts the process, and for that reason we welcome it and will vote for it.

Jimmy Hood: The hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (John Thurso) started his speech by telling us about the wonderful plaudits for proportional representation. He said that PR benefits the public. I will tell the House who PR benefited at the last Scottish Parliament elections. The party that 86 per cent of the people voted against decided who would be the First Minister. That is what PR did for the people of Scotland. Those who argue the case for PR should remember that very simple fact.

Alex Salmond: Did it come to the wrong decision?

Jimmy Hood: It certainly did not, but I did not agree with some of the arguments that were put forward in support of that decision. I certainly did not support the move for PR for local government. I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving me the opportunity to put that on the record.
	I, too, should like to put on record a bit of history. We have had some history from the Secretary of State tonight and from others. I was fortunate to be present for a lot of the discussions on the various electoral systems, and, as most Labour Members will know, the Labour party was dragged into supporting PR at the Scottish convention. Let me tell the House how the votes stacked up in the Scottish Executive when the decision was made. It was an equal vote and the chairman's casting vote decided it. The chairman at the time was a Member of Parliament from one of the Edinburgh constituencies. He is not with us, so I shall not name him. The Member of Parliament who was supposed to represent the Westminster Members of Parliament on the Scottish Executive, the overwhelming majority of whom were against PR, voted for PR against the wishes of his Westminster colleagues. Those Labour Members who, to put it politely, may wish to reconsider history, should remember that the Labour party is strongly against PR.

Robert Smith: I accept that many in the Labour party are strongly against PR, but if the hon. Gentleman looks back at the history, was it not that those who believed that a Scottish parliament was essential to good governance in Scotland realised that the only way in which that could be delivered was by agreeing to PR to reassure the electorate in Scotland, particularly outside of Glasgow and Edinburgh, that they could vote for a Scottish parliament in the referendum? It was only by delivering PR that Labour, and people such as Donald Dewar, realised that we could finally get a Scottish parliament to look at legislation in Scotland.

Jimmy Hood: In 1997, the Labour Government could have legislated for a Scottish Parliament with a first-past-the-post system and we would have had better governance in Scotland now than perhaps we have with the wishy-washy Liberals as part of the Executive.
	To return to my trip down memory lane, the Labour party accepted—

Angus Robertson: That is new consensus politics, is it?

Jimmy Hood: The Labour party accepted the consensus of the convention and went into the election promising to legislate, but with a caveat that we would put it to the people through a referendum, and it would be, to use the words of the much maligned Donald Dewar—unfairly so—the settled will of the Scottish people. It was the Scottish people who decided by an overwhelming vote in the referendum what the electoral system should be, and it was partly first past the post and partly PR.
	What we are debating today does not honour the settled will of the Scottish people or the consensus on keeping PR. I get the distinct feeling that Labour Members have been sleepwalked, and I say to my friends and colleagues in the Scottish Parliament that the MSPs have been sleepwalked, into PR, which the Labour party would never have supported in the convention. That was never part of the negotiations in that settlement. I do not share the point of view of those who say that it was always the intention to keep the size of the Parliament at 129 Members and to change the electoral system.
	There was a huge row when the Prime Minister and Lord Robertson, then the shadow Secretary of State for Scotland, argued the case for the referendum. There were to be two votes, and I supported the argument for the referendum. I can remember telling the then Leader of the Opposition, now the Prime Minister, that I was supporting the call for the referendum to entrench the will of the Scottish people in the settlement. We argued for entrenchment because we were worried about a future Tory party coming in and undoing the Scottish Parliament, which we supported. Yet here we are debating a narrow change in the Scotland Act 1998, which those of us who strongly believe in first past the post—there are a number of us in Scotland, especially within the Scottish Labour party—think means that what we agreed to, which we supported in good faith, will be taken away from us, and I do not feel at all comfortable with that.
	The reduction in the number of MSPs was part of that agreement. No one said to me at any time that they wanted to keep the same number of MSPs. Sacrosanct to me was the coterminosity of the constituency boundaries of the MSPs and the Westminster MPs, and that is so important today. For example, under the new boundaries there are two seats in Lanarkshire. One is Lanark and Hamilton, East and the other East Kilbride.

Frank Roy: South Lanarkshire.

Jimmy Hood: It is fair to draw that distinction, and I will too.
	I shall speak slowly for emphasis. There has been talk of over-governance, but 19 MSPs will have a claim to the Lanark and Hamilton, East seat, and 19 MSPs will have a claim to the East Kilbride seat. How can we justify that so-called governance? We are not talking about over-governance. In moving away from what we originally agreed, we could be bringing ourselves into disrepute.
	We had two consultations, because the first had to be extended for six months because no one was very interested. I have heard that there were 17 representations in support of the case for reducing the number of 129 Members. During the six-month extension, there was a considerable increase in the number of contributions.
	Then we had the statement from my right hon. Friend the Member for Airdrie and Shotts (Mrs. Liddell) as Secretary of State for Scotland. One of the things in that statement that alarmed me, which I remember pointing out, was the setting up of the commission after 2007. I am pleased that the Secretary of State returned to that issue and spoke about setting up a commission straight away.
	I share some of the views of my hon. Friends about this commission of the wonderful and good. I am sure that it will include experts and independent people, but I have yet to meet people who are independent but do not have a view on a range of issues. I do not want us to start hiring out—I borrow a phrase that I have heard in the House—the decisions of Parliament to commissions and committees. Decisions on legislation should be taken by the legislators. It is for us to take such decisions. There has obviously been an agreement with the Government to keep the 129 Members, and I have no difficulty with that, but the consequential changes in the electoral system must be looked at, and I do not think that they should be dealt with by independent commissions. I have no objections to such bodies having a look at those matters, but I must be firm in saying that it is a must that the decisions on whatever electoral system flows from the decision to keep the 129 Members should be for this Parliament and this Parliament alone. Such decisions should not be influenced by people who are outside Parliament, and even outside the Scottish Parliament. I hold that view very firmly indeed.

Mohammad Sarwar: I support my hon. Friend 100 per cent. in saying that constituency boundaries for the Scottish Parliament and the Westminster Parliament should be coterminous. If the Electoral Commission came up with a proposal that gave us coterminous boundaries with proportionality, would he accept it?

Jimmy Hood: No. I support the first-past-the-post system. Unless the system has a first-past-the-post ingredient, I shall certainly not support it.

Frank Roy: Does my hon. Friend agree that, for many people, proportional representation is something that is spoken about by the chattering classes and not the ordinary men and women of Scotland? Does he think that, when the independent commission is formed, it will include miners, steelworkers, shipbuilders, doctors, nurses and housewives?

Jimmy Hood: I would be pleasantly surprised if such people were included on the commission. Of course, I am sure that there will be no lawyers and so on!
	I shall not support the Conservatives in their opportunistic approach. A fortnight ago tomorrow, the hon. Member for Galloway and Upper Nithsdale (Mr. Duncan) said that he would not vote in principle on an English issue. I wonder how many English MPs will traipse through the Lobby this evening.

Peter Duncan: Does the hon. Gentleman not understand the simple truth that the matter under discussion is not devolved to the Scottish Parliament? Higher education in Scotland is devolved to the Scottish Parliament.

Jimmy Hood: Having listened to the Secretary of State and read the Bill, I take the view that the decision will affect only the Scottish Parliament. That is my reading of the Bill, and I suspect that the hon. Gentleman entirely understands that.
	If the decision is that the 129 figure is sacrosanct, I want common boundaries. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley, North (Mrs. Adams), the Chairman of the Select Committee on Scottish Affairs, on an excellent report and on raising all the issues. It is important that we have a first-past-the-post element and an element of proportionality, to keep faith with what was decided in the convention that was agreed before the Scotland Act took effect. Along with some colleagues, I hope to table amendments on that issue for consideration in Committee.
	I wish to end my speech with a message for my colleagues in the Scottish Parliament. When they get the opportunity to make representations to the august commission that is going to be set up, they should remember that the best way of preserving the rights of their representation and of keeping their job in that Parliament will be to support the system that still includes first past the post. Without that, they will be sleepwalking into a 100 per cent. PR system that will give the Liberals total power over their Parliament and which will not give that power to the people, where it should be vested.

Jacqui Lait: It is a pleasure to take part in this debate, which has been somewhat hijacked by the announcement of the inquiry into the number of voting systems. I have a certain sympathy with the need for the commission, but I think that we will be doing down Scotland's education system if we suggest that the Scottish people cannot cope with four different voting systems. Perhaps it would be neater if the systems were the same, but I do not think that it is beyond the wit of Scots men and women to be able to cope with different voting systems, even in the same election.
	The Secretary of State referred to this Bill as a small Bill. In my view, it will be the first of many such small Bills. While most of us in the Chamber would agree that the devolution settlement is here to stay, the Scotland Act 1998 is not perfect legislation, as the Bill before us indicates. Not very long ago, we saw the report from Lord Norton, which pointed out the difficulties in respect of any seriously robust mechanism for dispute resolution. We may well find, for instance, that the publication of the NHS tariff in England and Wales has a knock-on effect on the Scottish health service, which could lead to disputes with the Scottish Parliament and Executive. Section 28(7) of the 1998 Act states:
	"This section does not affect the power of the Parliament of the United Kingdom to make laws for Scotland."
	That could cause difficulties in due course. That is why I think that this will be the first in a series of small Bills that will detain the House. We should not be complacent about the finality of the settlement.

Alistair Carmichael: I am anxious to explore why the hon. Lady thinks that the power of this place to legislate on Scottish matters should be a source of difficulty. Does she anticipate that, perhaps under some future Government, this place will seek to legislate on an otherwise devolved matter in defiance of the Scottish Parliament?

Jacqui Lait: I am happy to deal with that point. Indeed, that is why I cited the NHS tariff, which could have a knock-on effect on the Scottish health service. Under the 1998 Act, the Scottish Parliament controls the delivery of the Scottish health service, so it may have a difficulty with the way in which the tariff interacts with the Scottish health system. As time passes and different policies are introduced, perhaps under different parties, there will be no reason why such difficulties should not emerge, and they will have to be dealt with one way or another.
	I take great pleasure in supporting my Front-Bench colleagues in opposing the Bill. I am not doing that entirely because of the arguments made during the passage of the Scotland Act. I thought it was a mistake that the Government were not prepared to decide that the number of MSPs should be a responsibility of the Scottish Parliament. That showed that the Government were not quite prepared to treat the Scottish Parliament as a grown-up Parliament.

Alex Salmond: Hear, hear.

Jacqui Lait: I would hate to give any comfort to the Scottish National party, because I recognise that that is its policy.

Robert Smith: The hon. Lady says that she will vote against the Bill but feels that it should be up to the Scottish Parliament to decide what size that Parliament should be. The Scottish Parliament has asked for this Bill to be passed. If she believes that the Scottish Parliament should be listened to, should she not listen to it and vote for the Bill?

Jacqui Lait: I said that the Scottish Parliament should make the decision, not this House. The Labour Government did not have the courage of their convictions in giving the Scottish Parliament that power.

Alex Salmond: Just because the Labour Government do not have the courage of their convictions is no excuse for the hon. Lady not to have the courage of hers. By a massive majority, the Scottish Parliament wants to stay at 129. Why will she not support it?

Jacqui Lait: In my view, the Scottish Parliament has not had a true opportunity to examine the reduction in numbers. That is not the principal reason why I am against the Bill; the key reason is that I believe in smaller government.

Brian H Donohoe: Given that Opposition Front-Bench spokesmen have been unable to give the numbers they are proposing, will the hon. Lady do so?

Jacqui Lait: If the hon. Gentleman took part in the Scottish Parliament elections, he will remember that we made it clear how we believed the Scottish Parliament should be structured. We believed that the number of first-past-the-post Members should be reduced to the same number as the Westminster constituencies. There should then be a top-up of 49 from the list system, making 108. We also said that we could not understand why 22 Ministers were required in Scotland. I used to work in the Scottish Office in the good old days when four Ministers managed to run all the legislation. [Hon. Members: "The poll tax?"] I should point out that I worked there when the Labour Government were in power between 1974 and 1979. [Hon. Members: "Is that why they lost?"] I would love to think that one civil servant could have that impact on a Labour Government; they imploded in the same way as this one is imploding.
	In terms of the way in which legislation is dealt with in the Scottish Parliament, there is an argument for more Ministers; we argued for eight. We argued also for a reduction in the number of Committees in the Scottish Parliament. We believe that Scotland is over-governed and there are too many politicians. Approximately 10 per cent. of the population of the United Kingdom live in Scotland, but there are 129 MSPs compared with 659 Members here; that proportion is equivalent to about 20 per cent. Scotland would benefit from a reduction in the number of politicians, which is why we oppose the Bill.

Alistair Carmichael: The hon. Lady says that it is her party's policy to make the number of Members here the same as the number of constituency MSPs in the Scottish Parliament. Is she telling my constituents that she will end the separate representation of Orkney and Shetland? My constituents would be interested to hear that.

Jacqui Lait: I apologise; that was a small slip. I thank the hon. Gentleman for correcting me. However, the principle remains the same.
	The support expressed for the retention of 129 MSPs brings to mind a phrase that no one has yet quoted, concerning trotters and troughs. Over the past two years, there has been huge criticism in Scotland of the number of MSPs and people believe that the Parliament would benefit from a reduction in numbers.
	Many people have talked about the difficulty of coterminosity. I sympathise with those who are dealing with, potentially, 19 Members of both Parliaments. That must be difficult, but it is not beyond the wit of man or woman to work with those numbers. To a much lesser extent, all of us are dealing with coterminosity problems because, as a result of proportional representation, we have to deal with a multiplicity of Members of the European Parliament.

Frank Roy: The hon. Lady says that it is not beyond the wit of man to work with 19 MSPs. Is she saying that we should keep the same number? That is not what she was saying earlier.

Jacqui Lait: I was sympathising with the difficulty of dealing with a multiplicity of Members of the Scottish Parliament and of this Parliament; I talked about "Parliaments". In my constituency of Beckenham, I have to deal with eight MEPs; not as many as 19, or the 15 that that might be reduced to. However, there is a problem of coterminosity throughout the system, largely because—here I agree with the hon. Member for Clydesdale (Mr. Hood)—of proportional representation. If we got rid of PR, we would not have coterminosity problems. With first past the post, all these problems iron themselves out. I do not have a problem with the first-past-the-post system; neither do the Conservatives. The foreign importation of PR is causing a lot of problems.

Frank Roy: Will the hon. Lady give way?

Jacqui Lait: Have I confused the hon. Gentleman again?

Frank Roy: Slightly. If the hon. Lady is saying that the first-past-the-post system is not a problem and that she agrees with it, why does she not say that the whole of the Scottish Parliament should be elected according to that arrangement?

Jacqui Lait: If I were a purist, I could be tempted down that route. I am tempted also to compare the opinion polls now with those before the last parliamentary elections, but I will resist. I support the first-past-the-post system for all elections and I have sympathy with hon. Members who talk about coterminosity. I cannot see how the proposed election system will sort out that issue. However, it is much more important to give better governance to the Scottish people, and that will come about by reducing the number of MSPs. That is why I will be voting against the Government.

John MacDougall: Are you making the point that you want to decide today to reduce the number of MSPs, but that you want to give the Scottish Parliament the decision on whether it should retain the figure of 129?

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I am not seeking to make any decisions. I think the hon. Gentleman means the hon. Lady.

Jacqui Lait: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I would suggest that the issue before us today is that of the number of Members of the Scottish Parliament. On that basis, I shall vote against the Bill, because it maintains that number.
	No hon. Member—other than the Secretary of State, for which I give him credit—talked about the second part of the Bill, which deals with boundaries and the demise of the boundary commissions. That is covered by the legislation on the Electoral Commission. Nevertheless, it is a great shame that the boundary commissions are disappearing, given their very high reputation for impartiality. I hope that the breadth of responsibilities assumed by the Electoral Commission will not in any way, shape or form impinge on the boundary commissions, which have done such a good job for us throughout the country over many years.
	On those grounds, I will vote with the Opposition tonight to oppose the maintenance of the number of Members of the Scottish Parliament.

Brian Wilson: I need hardly say that I shall not be joining the hon. Member for Hastings and Rye—

Jacqui Lait: I am hugely grateful to the hon. Gentleman, but my constituency is Beckenham—it used to be Hastings and Rye.

Brian Wilson: I apologise to the hon. Lady—I have clearly been here too long. She has refreshed my memory; I now remember that she was first burned in effigy, then voted out in Hastings.
	I am afraid that this is the last point at which I can bring much comfort to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. I sympathise with my right hon. Friend, whom I do not hold responsible in any way for what we face, and who is doing his best to bring some sort of reason and order to a very bad job. However, questions must be asked and fundamental criticisms made regarding how we got here.
	Usually, when a Bill comes before the House it can be argued for, however misguidedly, on the ground that it advances the public interest in some way. However, this Bill is the exception: I cannot find any conceivable public interest that will be served by it. On the contrary, it is, as we all know, simply the legislative follow-up to a political fix. The problem that initially confronted us was quite straightforward. Our Government had made two relevant commitments, both of which I accepted and subscribed to: first, to cut the number of Scottish MPs being returned to Westminster; and, secondly, to amend the number of MSPs sitting in the Scottish Parliament in the same proportion.
	So far, so good. If proceeded with in conjunction, those measures would have enjoyed general public support, apart from a few bleatings from the political fringes in Scotland. The problem is that the second commitment was reneged on to appease those political fringes and their vociferous supporters among the Scottish chattering classes. However, going ahead with the first commitment and abandoning the second is not a victimless solution. Without doubt, our two commitments were interdependent in their logic and symmetry: if one is abandoned, the other makes no sense, or, at the very least, will have to be paid for in another way.
	I feel sufficiently exercised to speak in this way on a Government measure because I believe that the confusion that will be created by abandoning the second part of the Government's commitment will be paid for by the people whom we are all supposed to be here to represent. That is the nature of the fix that has been entered into. In order to avoid reducing the number of MSPs, further confusion will be heaped gratuitously on to the old, the frail and the vulnerable, who from time to time need to consult their elected representatives. In arriving at that fix, no member of the political classes gave a single thought to those people—our constituents. That, I regret to say, has been the spirit of the debate. With the exception of one brief reference by the Secretary of State, no mention has been made of the Bill's effects on the people who do not necessarily always want us, but sometimes need us.
	There is already a great deal of confusion in Scottish politics about the delineation between reserved and devolved matters, although most of us can help to overcome that problem simply by sharing offices and providing what amounts to a joint service—admittedly, not in every part of Scotland, but in most parts. Further confusion is created by that curious breed of humanity, list MSPs, who, to all intents and purposes, have no constituencies and no constituents. Some of them find that extremely satisfactory, for obvious reasons, and do not trouble anyone; others are Walter Mitty characters who set themselves up as alternative MSPs in specific constituencies and tout for business from the unwary. However, as long as there are recognisable constituencies, the vast majority of people in Scotland at least know which constituency they live in and who their elected constituency representatives are—where to go and to whom to go. Now, gratuitously and for no good reason, even that safeguard of the public interest is casually to be dispensed with. Hundreds of thousands of people throughout Scotland will find themselves in one constituency for Westminster purposes and another constituency for Holyrood purposes. Constituencies where MPs and MSPs work well together to give an integrated service will be split two, three or even four different ways. As we have heard, some Westminster constituencies will be shadowed, for devolved purposes, by up to 20 MSPs. The whole thing is ludicrous—and entirely unnecessary, because all we had to do was stick to the two original commitments.
	What I find really offensive about this episode is not some abstract political aspect, nor any of the stuff that has been bandied about this evening, but the complete lack of regard for the consumer interest. It has been all about politicians looking for a way out of a minor political dilemma that will cause the least inconvenience to other politicians: never mind the punters who have to track down the person who can be of use to them at a particular time; never mind the view that the public will take of a new system that might have been designed for the sole purpose of confusing them and bringing political representation into further disrepute; and never mind the highly relevant fact cited by my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley, North (Mrs. Adams), that 15 per cent. of voters have been driven away from the polls by the confusions already created in Scottish politics.
	The horse must be put back in front of the cart—the anomalies must be addressed in advance of the changes being made, not at some dim and distant point in the future. That is where I disagree with the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (John Thurso). He spent half his speech talking about the virtues of coterminousity—or coterminality, or whatever term happens to be in fashion tonight—but we are introducing legislation that will abolish that virtue. This is not a done deed—we are setting up a commission to revise what has not yet been legislated for. Would it not be better to do things in chronological order by addressing the problems before they have been created?
	All along, the starting point for this exercise should have been that the boundaries remain the same for Westminster and Holyrood: non-negotiable, full stop. That was the way in which to concentrate minds, and that is what we should still do.

Alex Salmond: Surely, as the Secretary of State said, there are already problems in relation to different electoral systems. Any of us might share the hon. Gentleman's thoughts about the list system—which, after all, was introduced by the Government in whom he served—but are we not being offered the prospect of some of those difficulties being attended to?

Brian Wilson: I respectfully suggest that acceptance of that proposition displays some naiveté on the hon. Gentleman's part; and I suspect that if there is one thing that he does not like being accused of, it is that. To me, the commission sounds like a classic Sir Humphrey mechanism. One can imagine the discussion that took place: "We are creating a shambles—what are we to do? We'll set up a commission. When will the commission report? After the shambles has been created." I revert to my original point—why not get the chronology right and sort everything out before the shambles is created?
	I have no quarrel with the remit or the outcome of the boundary commission review of Scottish seats, but it is not too late to say that it will be implemented only when a compatible formula, based on coterminal constituency boundaries, has been agreed for the Scottish Parliament.
	I do not believe that the figure of 108 is any more sacrosanct than 129. If people want 130, 150 or 170 seats, I do not care very much. Electoral systems can be devised to satisfy any of those numbers. However, the system must be created on the basis of the same boundaries for both elections. I am not, therefore, devising a way of getting rid of 21 MSPs, although I doubt whether maintaining, under all circumstances, 129 MSPs is a great popular cause in Scotland. If that is the stumbling block, there are other methods of dealing with it. However, the way is not to destroy one of the few things that provide political and representational comprehension in Scotland: the fact that we have the same boundaries, the same offices and the same representation.
	I repeat that I do not blame my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, but I ask him to consider the course that I have outlined if it is the only way to force progress on the wider issue, and not to implement the Bill until coterminality has been sorted out. Surely there can be unanimity in the parties in Scotland: whatever the perceptions of marginal short-term political advantage or disadvantage, we do not want to legislate to establish an electoral system that we all know will work to the practical, and in some cases serious disadvantage, of our constituents.
	If, even at this late stage, we do not stop to contemplate the essential stupidity of what is being done, people in Scotland who are adversely affected by the measure will have a long time to wonder how politicians could create a total mess out of something that should be as straightforward and comprehensible as possible.

Pete Wishart: It is a pleasure and a privilege to take part in the first debate on the Scotland Act since it was passed in 1998. We follow many illustrious speakers in the debates on that measure, including my hon. Friend the Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond), and many Labour Members. It is unfortunate that the way in which the Bill is framed means that we have no opportunity to discuss the many pertinent issues that affect the Scottish Parliament. An opportunity has been lost.
	With due respect to the Secretary of State, the debate is a little hypothetical. We are working on the assumption that the number of Scottish Members of Parliament will be reduced at the next general election. However, no one has said definitively that that will happen. Let us imagine that a general election takes place in two months—that was entirely possible a few weeks ago. We would fight with the existing boundaries. What would happen in 2007? On what sort of membership would we fight an election for the Scottish Parliament? There are many questions to ask. Our debate is based on an assumption that the number of Members of Parliament will be reduced. I appeal to the Under-Secretary to tell us when she replies to the debate whether we shall fight the next general election under existing boundaries.
	This first debate on the Scotland Act since it was passed is timely. The Scottish Parliament is at a crossroads and faces severe challenges. It has lost the confidence of the Scottish people, and we should be considering many other subjects, instead of wasting time on coterminosity and voting arrangements. We wanted to introduce a series of amendments that would give the Scottish Parliament new powers. It is unfortunate that we will not have an opportunity to do that.
	I examined the Scottish social attitudes survey, which has appeared in several newspapers, and the Scottish people appear to be two or three steps ahead of the Government and the Scottish Executive, because their solution to some of the Scottish Parliament's difficulties is to increase its powers. The overwhelming majority of the Scottish people who took part in the survey suggested giving the Scottish Parliament more powers as a method of tackling its difficulties. Every survey that has been conducted appears to yield the same results: people believe that the Scottish Parliament needs more powers to meet the genuine expectations that the Scottish public had when it was established.
	I was impressed with the debate that we held in the Scottish Grand Committee a couple of months ago on a Liberal Democrat motion about the evolution of the devolution settlement. Much good came out of that. We did not agree on many things, but we all signed up to one overriding statement: devolution is a process, not an event. We might have difficulty in defining where the process ends—that is a legitimate debate, which it is right to hold—but I listened carefully and eagerly to Labour Members, and they too said that devolution was not an event but a process. We might be different from hon. Members of other parties because we are impatient for the process to continue. We want some progress to show that devolution is a process. I hope that we shall get there.
	I am sure that the Secretary of State has been impressed by some of the debates in the Scottish Parliament. Even some notable and eminent Labour MSPs now believe, along with so much of Scottish civic society and the business community, that the Scottish Parliament needs greater fiscal and economic powers. We have a notable new recruit to that campaign in the shape of Robert Crawford, the former chief executive of Scottish Enterprise.

Rosemary McKenna: The hon. Gentleman should not be surprised at Mr. Robert Crawford's return to the Scottish National party fold.

Pete Wishart: I am not sure about that, but we cannot ignore the views of someone who ran Scottish Enterprise and knows much about what the Scottish economy requires and what makes it tick.
	We will support Second Reading. We believe that a minimum of 129 MSPs is required to ensure that the Scottish Parliament runs efficiently and effectively. All the political parties—apart from the Conservative party—are signed up to that figure. I was impressed by some of the evidence that was given to the Select Committee on Scottish Affairs when the question was put. Many people said that 129 MSPs were required to make the effective Committee system work. It was identified as one of the Scottish Parliament's strengths. Its pre-legislative scrutiny is one of the most valuable aspects of work in the Scottish Parliament. The Select Committee report clearly concluded that 129 MSPs were required.
	There are honourable exceptions in the Labour ranks who do not support the figure of 129, and we have heard some contributions from them this evening. I am thankful that they, in conjunction with the Conservatives, are lonely and isolated voices. I shall be interested to note how many Labour Members vote with Conservative Members, in alliance against the Scottish Parliament. As I said, they are isolated, forlorn voices.
	It will surprise the Scottish public to find that the House of Commons determines the membership of the Scottish Parliament and that distant Westminster decides on its voting arrangements. Surely our national Parliament should have that task, and be able to determine its voting arrangements and membership.

Irene Adams: How many people in the hon. Gentleman's surgeries have asked him about that?

Pete Wishart: The hon. Lady might be surprised to learn that no one has asked me about such matters. However, MSPs are exercised by the question because the Scottish Parliament should be wary if the House legislates on its behalf about membership and voting arrangements. Surely a national Parliament should legislate on those matters. The Scottish Parliament is unique among national Parliaments in having to cede power on those matters to another national Parliament. That is not right.
	We noted with interest the establishment of the Secretary of State's new commission to examine the arrangements. Like the Liberal Democrats, we are waiting for an invitation to serve on it. I read about the matter in The Herald today. I do not know why the Secretary of State did not tell the House before going to the newspaper. The commission appears to be a political fix. I sympathise with the Secretary of State because I know that he has a little local difficulty. On the one hand, hon. Members from the Scottish Labour ranks are determining the agenda about voting arrangements and the membership of the Scottish Parliament, and on the other, there is great anxiety among Labour MSPs who are worried about the activities of the crowd who sit behind the right hon. Gentleman. Labour MSPs should be worried about what Labour Members of Parliament are up to.

Brian H Donohoe: Does the hon. Gentleman not accept that the biggest problem in Scottish politics today is the list system? The list mainly consists of members of his party.

Pete Wishart: The list system may be the biggest problem in Scottish politics for the hon. Gentleman, but it certainly is not for me. There are much more important issues to address, and I wish that he would sometimes recognise that.
	List Members have two key functions. One is to provide the proportionality required by the Scotland Act 1998. The second function, however, at which they seem to be effective, is to wind up Labour Members. They perform that task spectacularly, and Labour Members fall for it every time. I have a list Conservative Member in my constituency, who has set up an office in my constituency and sniffs around for any scrap of attention, but we deal with him effectively. He has stood previously against me and my SNP colleague, John Swinney, and we have beaten him in successive elections. That is no problem, but I can understand why it is a problem for Labour Members, because most of them have run their constituencies like personal fiefdoms. When an energetic, enthusiastic list Member appears and tries to do things, it is a real challenge to them. If we cannot rise above the challenge of energetic and enthusiastic list Members, perhaps we do not deserve a place in this House at all.

Jimmy Hood: Does the hon. Gentleman think it right that a Conservative Member, or a member of any political party who has not been elected in his constituency by the will of the people, is allowed to spend taxpayers' money on funding offices to work against an elected person?

Pete Wishart: That is the very system for which the hon. Gentleman voted in the Scotland Act. It is a consequence of the decision that you took, and you must accept it. He may not have voted for it personally—[Interruption.] I am told from a sedentary position that he did. You voted for it, and you must accept the consequences.

Jimmy Hood: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. First, let me make it clear that I never voted for anything. Secondly, I do not think that the hon. Gentleman is giving way a second time.

Pete Wishart: I have looked at the amendments suggested by the Scottish Affairs Committee, which effectively propose the death knell of proportionality for the Scottish Parliament. [Hon. Members: "Hear, hear."] I hear hon. Members say, "Hear, hear." I know that that is their intention and their agenda. What I do not understand about the Scottish Affairs Committee report, which I have examined carefully, is that the great and the good came down to give evidence—all the political parties, all the local authorities, the whole of civil society in Scotland—but it is as if the Committee made up a conclusion different from the evidence that it took. Most of its conclusions fly in the face of the evidence that it was given. I suggest respectfully to members of the Scottish Affairs Committee that instead of getting the great and the good down from Scotland to give them evidence for an agenda on which they had already made up their mind, they should have just had the right hon. Member for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley (Mr. Foulkes) as the sole witness. Their conclusions would then probably have been much more credible.
	I have studied the evidence given to the Committee, and nowhere does any witness come forward and say, "I think that the solution to Scotland's electoral problems is to have two-Member constituencies." None of them said that, and some of them would probably laugh in the face of anyone who suggested it to them. I am intrigued as to whether any of the later contributors to this debate will explain how it will work. We have heard Labour Members' hostility to PR. They loathe it and think that it is an absurd system—that is their point of view. I presume that in two-Member constituencies the winner and the runner-up will be elected to the Scottish Parliament. What a ridiculous way to elect a Parliament—regardless of the fact that my party would do quite well under such a system.

Jimmy Hood: Is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that it would be better if the winner and the candidate who came last were elected, as is the case under the list system at present?

Pete Wishart: I find the arrangement suggested by the Scottish Affairs Committee bizarre. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will catch your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and explain how it works. It is like turning up to play the Scottish cup final, picking up the ball and deciding not to have a competition—both teams share the cup. It is a bizarre sort of first-past-the-post-plus.
	Most of the witnesses to the Scottish Affairs Committee have little to say about coterminosity. Yes, most of them would like to see it happen, but it did not seem to be the defining issue for most of them, although the Scottish Affairs Committee concluded that it was the defining issue in Scottish politics. The public do not care a whit about coterminosity. It is not on their agenda at all. When I am out and about in Blairgowrie, members of the public do not come up to me to tell me how concerned they are about coterminosity. I have had a series of surgeries in the past few weeks throughout my North Tayside constituency, and I have not had anxious constituents coming to my surgery saying that they cannot sleep at night because the constituency boundaries of their MP and their MSP may be different.

David Cairns: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Pete Wishart: I am sorry, but I have no more time. I have a big speech to make.
	Yes, this is an issue for political parities, and it will present challenges for them. There are solutions, however. The Scottish National party has already framed solutions, and I am sure that with its resources and organisational ability, the Scottish Labour party can arrive at a solution, too, and I suspect that it will do so. People just do not care about this issue, however. For example, people in Pitlochry know that I am their MP—some of them might think that I am quite effective. People in Brechin, which is 50 miles away, also know that I am their Member of Parliament. It comes as a great surprise and shock to people in Brechin, however, to discover that I am the MP for Pitlochry, and people in Pitlochry are equally surprised to find that I am the MP for distant and remote Brechin. They could not care less, however, as long as they know who their MP is, know that their MP is effective, and know how he can be contacted. That is what concerns them most.
	I was impressed by the Secretary of State's evidence to the Scottish Affairs Committee, because he concluded that that was also true in city centres. People in city centres do not know where one boundary ends and the other begins—those were his words, and he is right. He gave a very good example: somebody could move through his Edinburgh, Central constituency and arrive at George square believing that they were in his constituency, but they would be in the constituency of the hon. Member for Edinburgh, North and Leith (Mr. Lazarowicz). Nobody knows where constituency boundaries are. They are boundaries that exist in the heads of politicians. The public could not care less.

Andrew Turner: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Pete Wishart: No, I am sorry. I have only a few minutes.
	What the Scottish Affairs Committee should have been doing was looking at the powers of the Scottish Parliament. As I said earlier, the Scottish Parliament is facing many severe challenges. It should be considering the sluggish economic growth in Scotland and the massive issues with which we must wrestle. What does it spend time doing? It has looked at the issue of co-terminosity, taken all the evidence, rejected the evidence that it received, and come to its own conclusions. I suggest respectfully that it should have been doing something more important. We look forward to the Secretary of State's commission, but let us hope that it will not just be a political fix to settle the difficulties in the Labour party between Westminster Members and Edinburgh Members.

Brian H Donohoe: I intend to be brief to allow more of my colleagues to speak in the debate.
	My first regret is that in the euphoria of the election campaign and afterwards in 1997, when the Bill that became the Scotland Act 1998 came to the House, I and some of my colleagues did not pay more attention to some of its content. If we had understood that we were going to sleepwalk into a situation in which we would be crawled all over by list Members, we would have looked at the Bill in a very different way. Tonight, we have the first stage of the opportunity to try to address that. On the basis of what the Secretary of State said in his statement, that process will be allowed to start.
	I commend to the House the Select Committee's report, as I believe, and have done for some considerable time, that the main problem in Scotland—

Alex Salmond: The hon. Gentleman may recall that I am very much in favour of proportional representation, and I have never thought that a regional list was a particularly good system. In relation to his solution, however, if he is concerned about list Members crawling all over this constituency, how much more would the person who came second want to crawl all over his constituency?

Brian H Donohoe: That person would be entitled to do so, but the responsiblities of the list Member were never defined as they should and probably could have been in that Act. That was a fundamental flaw. To a great extent, if that had been addressed, we would not be here tonight facing this quandary.
	I suspect that few people in my constituency and probably throughout Scotland, apart from the chattering classes, are unduly concerned about the number of MSPs, or indeed the number of MPs. What concerns people, and what is more important, is the delivery of a service. They care about education, the NHS, the economy and employment levels, and to that extent the Labour party has indeed delivered, both down here and in Edinburgh. What they will not recognise is the existence of some magic in the requirement for 129 MSPs to be retained, or in the method adopted for their election. Not one ordinary constituent has complained to me about the way in which the present system affects him or her—because it does not affect my constituents at all. What it does is create confusion in the minds of the public. As has been said, the big problem relates to who represents the public in the Scottish Parliament and in this Parliament.
	Why have we found ourselves in this position? While the Scotland Act 1998 was being debated, it was made clear that coterminous boundaries would be maintained. Only now do we find that what has happened since then is leading us towards a problem. I foresee a major problem, and have for some time. For some time I have argued forcefully, in any forum that has allowed me to do so, about the whole question of coterminosity, because I cannot accept any other arrangement.
	All today's speeches so far, apart from those of SNP Members, have suggested that there is much to be said for coterminous boundaries. Both Conservatives and Liberal Democrats have expressed that view; the SNP is out on a limb, but we know that its sole aim is to separate Scotland from the rest of the United Kingdom.
	Aspects of the independent commission also worry me. Although it has been said that the time scale will be as limited as possible, we have been told nothing more about it; nor has the Secretary of State told us how many members the commission will have, and where they will come from. He must clarify both those points before he receives the support that would otherwise be forthcoming.
	As I have said, we have heard many arguments today about possible systems, such as proportional representation and the single transferable vote, but I do not think that the Bill's narrow drafting even allows for such arguments. It allows only for simple clauses dealing with coterminosity, and I want to concentrate on that rather than those other questions, or the question of reduction. I must point out, however, that the arithmetic of the hon. Member for Galloway and Upper Nithsdale (Mr. Duncan), or that of the Tory party, is not very good. The hon. Gentleman says that, under his preferred system, there would be about 108 MSPs. According to a simple calculator, the figure is 104.26. I would not like to say who the 0.26 would be, but maintaining proportionality would require some 45 additional Members. I do not know where the hon. Gentleman got the figure that he gave.

Peter Duncan: There is a straightforward explanation. The fact that Orkney and Shetland are separate constituencies results in a greater proportion of the total number of MSPs.

Brian H Donohoe: That does not add up. There are still four Members coming from somewhere in the system who are unaccounted for.
	I want to simplify the position. I have heard many arguments about what is possible, but I want to concentrate on what is feasible. Something must be put together that will be accepted not just by my colleagues and me, but by the mainstream in the Chamber and outside. I believe that allowing two MSPs per Westminster constituency would simplify everything, although Orkney and Shetland would remain separate. According to my arithmetic there would then be some 118 Members with a first-past-the-post system, if the commission adopted it. I do not want to close any doors in that regard. Then there are the additional Members. If there were 11, with six in one region and five in the other, we could maintain the total of 129, which seems to have been accepted by everyone.

Robert Syms: I am beginning to feel a little sorry for the Secretary of State, who has had to sit there and be subjected to a barrage from his Back Benchers. Some of my comments may prove to be more supportive of his position than those of many members of the Scottish Labour party—although I hasten to add that I will be joining my colleagues in the Lobby to vote against the Bill.
	In deciding whether to reduce the size of the Scottish Parliament from 129 Members to 108, we must establish whether it would still be able to scrutinise the Executive properly, whether the reduction would increase the value of Ministers to the detriment of both Government and Opposition Back Benchers, and whether—given that the Scottish Parliament is unicameral—it would be able to fulfil its roles adequately. No one has made a case for that so far today. I suspect that whether the Bill proves to be good or bad will depend on the Parliament's output. No doubt, during the Bill's progress, we shall hear more arguments of that kind rather than arguments about electoral systems in general.
	Much of today's debate seems to have been concerned with the additional member system and the list. Many Members representing Scottish constituencies clearly find that system frustrating. That does not surprise me: during the passage of the Scotland Bill I made a number of speeches opposing it. I am a thorough believer in first past the post, for many fundamental reasons. I think that, partly owing to its simplicity but also because of the accountability it involves, it is the best system for the electorate.
	I do not think that a lack of coterminosity matters greatly if there are no list Members. Many other countries manage without coterminous districts, although they use first past the post. Indeed, for more than 70 years Northern Ireland elected Members to this Parliament—the imperial Parliament, as it was then—and Members representing much smaller constituencies to Stormont, both under first past the post. Canadians elect a federal Parliament and state Parliaments. The ridings and the state parliamentary areas are very different, except in the case of Ontario.

John Robertson: When the Scotland Bill was being put together, coterminosity, in terms of constituencies, was one of the building blocks for the country. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that taking away those building blocks would leave the way open for the disintegration of the Union as we know it?

Robert Syms: An argument made by many people when the Scotland Act 1998 was passed was that embedding Scottish representation in the Westminster constituencies would give rather more unity than the alternative system, but my point is that we do not necessarily have to have that system. The confusion is caused by having a list system, where several Members have an interest in lots of constituencies. It is perfectly possible to have different-sized constituencies, under first past the post, and proper parliamentary representation. In English constituencies, it is normal for county councillors to cover more than one parliamentary constituency; it does not make them bad county councillors, nor does it affect representation to this place.
	In federal Parliaments, such as those in Canada and the United States, there are districts of different sizes, with the exception of Ontario. In Australia, Tasmania is the only state where districts are the same size—most others have different systems. In Germany, the Lander have different sized districts and there is AMS at both federal and state level. In the United States of America, which uses a first-past-the-post system, there are some bizarrely designed districts—there are all sorts of different sizes for all sorts of different offices—yet the system works pretty effectively.
	I do not think that we need to have a fetish about coterminosity, but the electoral system is key. That is why AMS is causing problems north of the border, although, apart from first past the post, no other system would be preferable. However, there is no doubt about the problem and the Secretary of State is correct to look into the systems. There is a first-past-the-post system for Westminster, AMS for the Scottish Parliament and a list system for Europe and we may be moving towards a single transferable vote system for local government, which will cause confusion. The line taken by the Government has helped that confusion; for example, there was no need for them to bring in a list system for the European Parliament. I voted against that, as I preferred a first-past-the-post system.
	The confusion will inevitably give rise to concern, which could lead to lower turnouts, because people will not understand the system. There is a big misconception in the AMS system. The second vote is more important than the first one, as the second vote determines the relative relationship of all the other parties. I was talking to the German ambassador about that point and even he had not realised it, yet under the German system the second vote is important.
	Overall, it seems sensible to hold an independent inquiry into the relative systems, as, if possible, we do not want a proliferation of systems. It would have been better to go back to first past the post, which is a simpler and more accountable system. I do not necessarily believe that everything has to be coterminous; providing that the system is simple, we do not need the same districts for representation—I have given several examples of that.
	On balance, I shall vote with my colleagues for 108 rather than 129, because I do not believe that the arguments have yet been made on scrutiny and on balance between the Executive and Back Benchers or about whether the Scottish Parliament would do a better job. Perhaps those arguments will be made in Committee.
	Some aspects will add a political cost. If there are separate boundaries, we shall have to have separate reviews and separate electoral registers. A dual system will mean costs for local government north of the border and they will fall on the Scottish taxpayer. When Members vote, they should take account of the fact that duplication may have certain costs.
	As many Members want to speak, I shall conclude my remarks.

John Lyons: The Scottish Affairs Committee took extensive evidence before it published its report. At the outset, may I refute the claim that the reports of the evidence did not match what we had heard? That was not the case. For example, on the 129-Member question, almost everyone who appeared before the Committee—whether from political parties or independent groups—came down in favour of retaining that number.
	The report stated:
	"During its evidence sessions, the Committee was not made aware of any good case for the current number of MSPs to be either reduced or increased. We are satisfied, therefore, that the number of MSPs should remain, for the time being, at 129."
	That exactly reflects the evidence that was given to the Select Committee.
	What was important for the Committee was not the mechanics of the 129 figure, or the mechanics of coterminosity but whether any changes would hinder or assist the greater involvement of the electorate. Would the changes be voter friendly? Would they clarify issues for the electorate or would they confuse the electorate even further?
	The hon. Member for North Tayside (Pete Wishart) has made a consistent point throughout the debate. He has asked whether our constituents tell us that they are worried about coterminosity and the answer is that they do not. However, in Strathkelvin and Bearsden, they ask me, "John, why should the town of Kirkintilloch be split in two for the new Westminster constituency, but remain as one for the Scottish Parliament constituency?" That is how they ask questions about coterminosity. They ask, "Why should the villages of Lennoxtown, Milton of Campsie or Twechar be taken away from the Westminster constituency but remain in the Scottish constituency?".
	Technically, those are arguments about coterminosity. That actual question is never asked, but people—quite properly—are interested in their local community and its past. For example, Kirkintilloch has never been split in its parliamentary history, but now it is being split for the Westminster constituency, while remaining whole for the Scottish Parliament. I agree that people do not say, "What about coterminosity?", but they ask pertinent and important questions about how their local communities are represented.
	In its evidence to the Select Committee, the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities said:
	"The creation of 59 Westminster Constituencies which do not have coterminous boundaries with 73 Scottish Parliament constituencies is likely to cause confusion among constituents who will be in different constituencies."
	No one will argue with that. There seems to be broad support for the view that that would be a major difficulty and a major problem.
	Even non-political groups agreed. The Association of Electoral Administrators said:
	"The lack of coincidence between Parliamentary Boundaries in Scotland is more likely to cause bewilderment for electors, especially those who reside in cross-boundary areas."
	That is not a political viewpoint; the association is independent and the administrators are politically objective. They know how to run elections and they clearly say that the lack of coterminosity could cause major problems.
	In its recommendations, the Committee stated:
	"Based on the evidence we have received, we recommend that, in order to avoid possible confusion, the constituency boundaries in Scotland for elections to the United Kingdom and to the Scottish Parliament should remain coterminous."
	The Committee did not reach that conclusion on its own; it was based firmly on the evidence that we heard.
	Another issue that has been raised in the debate was the possibility of two Members from the Scotland Parliament being balanced in a Westminster constituency. The Committee said that
	"our favoured option is to have 2 constituency MSPs for each new Westminster constituency, totalling 118 MSPs, with the remaining 11 MSPs being elected from a national list".
	As my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley, North (Mrs. Adams) said, the Committee did not recommend how that should be done.

Michael Weir: Is that not a difficulty with the report? I was a member of the Committee, and that recommendation did not seem to me to be backed up by the evidence. The report could have made a good point, but it chose to recommend the establishment of a commission and to suggest what it wanted the commission to find—the very thing that the Secretary of State was arguing against.

John Lyons: I appreciate the hon. Gentleman's point, but the evidence before the Committee was overwhelmingly about the list. People were reasonably satisfied about the possibility that there would be two MSPs in each Westminster constituency; the big and continual criticism was about the list system—for good reason. Questions about the list system have been repeated in the debate today. We have a system for which there is no public support: a candidate can stand for direct election to the Scottish Parliament, come last out of four or five candidates, yet walk into the Scottish Parliament by the back door and take their seat.
	That is clearly unacceptable to the Scottish people; they regard it as a fraud. It does not matter which political party gains by that system, or what it says about it; all of us should be embarrassed about it.

Jimmy Hood: The agriculture Minister of the Scottish Parliament—Captain Mainwaring himself—little Ross Finney, stands for election in Greenock year after year and always gets trounced; indeed, he was trounced in the last two Scottish parliamentary elections. Does my hon. Friend share my amazement at the fact that every morning, the people of Greenock wake up, having trounced Ross Finney, only to find out that he is not only in the Scottish Parliament, but in the Scottish Executive?

John Lyons: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making that point, because this is clearly a problem. Such people can enter not only the Parliament but the Cabinet. The fact that such things can happen must be an affront to us all, and to the democratic process.

Angus Robertson: Just to be clear that the hon. Gentleman is not making a cheap partisan point, does he include in his criticism the third place candidate in the Scottish parliamentary elections in Moray, Mr. Peter Peacock? He is now serving as a Scottish Executive Minister, having been defeated as a Labour candidate in Moray by the Scottish National party; indeed, he even came behind the Tories.

John Lyons: The point that I am making is an apolitical one: the system is not one that the Scottish people agree with. Those who come last in a direct election should not then be able to transfer to the list. If we are to have a list at all, there should be clear separation between those who want to stand in constituencies, and those who want stand in respect of the list.
	I shall give a few facts and figures, which have been provided by the Library. In the 1999 election, 56 list MSPs were elected, 12 of whom were not fighting constituency seats. The remaining 44 had been defeated and then entered Parliament via the list system. We might think that a big enough affront to us all, but let us consider what happened in 2003. Of the 56 list MSPs elected in that year, 44 were losing candidates in constituency seats.

Pete Wishart: The hon. Gentleman is being very generous in giving way. I understand and appreciate his hostility towards list MSPs, but we have heard it all before, so it is not really new. Can he explain why he wants to have two-Member constituencies? We do not know how they will be elected, except for some vague reference to the Electoral Commission's deciding on such matters. Is it being suggested that the winner and runner-up will be selected for those constituencies? If so, that is a far more ridiculous idea, because whoever is directly defeated—be it by a majority of 800 or 8,000—will get to serve. Such a solution is 10 times worse than that of list Members.

John Lyons: The hon. Gentleman misunderstands where I am coming from. I want to encourage more people to participate in elections for the Scottish Parliament, for Westminster and for the councils, but the fact is that the list system turns people off. According to the hon. Member for Paisley, North (Mrs. Adams), the Electoral Commission said the following of the question of the percentage:
	"Opinion polling following the 2003 elections in Scotland . . . suggested that 13 per cent. of non-voters claimed that confusion over the voting systems being used led them not to vote".
	We cannot afford to allow 13 per cent. of that populace to turn away from elections. We need to encourage them, and to try to ensure that they participate in elections in the way that we would like.

Michael Weir: I remember what was said well, because I questioned Mr. Younger at the time. The figure of 13 per cent. has gone into legend, but the hon. Gentleman should read on a little further in the report to discover what Mr. Younger said. He said that we should treat that figure with caution, and that
	"there is quite a lot of experience of earlier polling that suggests that some of these reasons are those that people think are the ones which make it look more respectable for their not having voted".
	In other words, he was casting doubt on the robustness of the 13 per cent. figure. On the face of it, that figure is very bad, but perhaps it is not quite as bad as it looks.

John Lyons: I am happy for any Member to say that they disagree, or that the figure is not robust enough; I am simply quoting the report and the polling organisation. I have no reason to think that the organisation has a jaundiced view of people participating in voting for the Scottish Parliament. I think it objective and fair, and I am prepared to accept its view. One might well argue that 13 per cent. is an underestimate of the number of people who do not vote because of confusion in the system. But as I said, the list system and its lack of accountability undermine the political and democratic process. It helps no politician if people have no trust or faith in it.
	I am old-fashioned enough to think that you should elect the person whom you want to represent you in the Scottish Parliament. It is as simple as—

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman is perhaps referring to hon. Members in his use of the second person.

John Lyons: Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. People should have the opportunity to make that decision, which they make on their own. They do not rely on the list system to allow someone to get into the Scottish Parliament through the back door.
	If we were to explain to students of higher modern studies or to first-year politics students that this is the system in the Scottish Parliament—

Bill Tynan: Does my hon. Friend agree that those who condemn and deride a system through which those who come first and second in a constituency election are elected to the Scottish Parliament have to examine why it should be that someone who comes fourth in a list system, for example, can be successful?

John Lyons: I am grateful for that intervention. There is no logic to the case made by those who argue that there is a major problem with the election of those who come first and second, or even with the creation of two separate seats. I am quite happy to go along with the list and all that that means, but the fact that we should have the system in question offends us all as democrats, irrespective of whether Labour, the Conservatives, the Liberal Democrats or any given party gains.
	The report points one way forward. It is not the solution, but if nothing else it lays a foundation for discussing proposals and recommendations that we can consider in future. That, if nothing else, is a worthy conclusion.

David Hamilton: It is extremely important that constituents understand who their Member is. First and second past the post is a very important issue. Through such a system, people can say to their Member, "You're to blame for not doing this", or "Thank you for doing that." Under a list system, that does not happen. The former system would provide clarification.

John Lyons: I am sure that it would. I am clear in my mind that the list is offensive to all democrats, and we should make that point clear.

Alistair Carmichael: It is a pleasure to participate in this debate, which, as the hon. Member for North Tayside (Pete Wishart) reminded us, is our first opportunity to revisit the Scotland Act 1998 on the Floor of the House. Indeed, it has been a good debate. I am sorry that the hon. Member for Cunninghame, North (Mr. Wilson) is not in his place, because his was one of the best contributions so far. I did not agree with a lot of it, but he made a powerfully argued and cogent case that demonstrated a certain and welcome independence of mind. I heard him speak on Friday's "Today" programme about the remit of the gas and electricity markets regulator in a similarly independent manner. I never heard him speak in that way when he was Minister with responsibility for energy, but we will leave that to one side for the moment.
	As I said, however, I do not agree with the hon. Member for Cunninghame, North because he seems to be unduly concerned with starting points. He says that we are in a muddled situation. I have no difficulty in agreeing that we are not necessarily in the best starting place, but where we finish is more important than where we start. Once we have been through the Bill, and through the commission process that the Secretary of State said will be introduced soon, we will end up, I hope, where we need to be. Frankly, that is what is important.
	I welcome the retention of the 129 Members of the Scottish Parliament. That is important, not least because it demonstrates to those Members that their views will be listened to here. Had we sought to proceed in open defiance of the clear majority of MSPs, we would have been introducing a constitutional tension into the debate.
	It does not surprise me that the Conservatives are not part of the consensus. They have never been part of any consensus for the development of the constitutional position in Scotland. The hon. Member for Rutland and Melton (Mr. Duncan) took the best approach that he could have done in the circumstances when he ditched what looked like the last three or four pages of his speech, said that this was a bad Bill, and sat down.
	The hon. Member for Beckenham (Mrs. Lait) made a more telling contribution when she outlined all the things that the Conservatives want for the Scottish Parliament: to reduce the number of Members; to reduce the number of Committees; and to reduce the number of Ministers. Everything that the Conservatives propose in the debate, it seems to me, is designed to reduce the effectiveness of the Scottish Parliament. That is no accident: they do not want the Scottish Parliament to succeed and they do not want it to be effective, because they never wanted it in the first place.

Peter Duncan: Is the hon. Gentleman absolutely convinced of the need for 22 Ministers to run the Scottish Executive?

Alistair Carmichael: The number of members of the Scottish Executive or the Cabinet is for the Scottish Parliament to decide, and it will be judged on that basis at the end of the day. I would remind the hon. Gentleman that the Conservatives stood for election in May last year on exactly the same set of proposals—to reduce this and reduce that—and were roundly trounced for their pains, so a little more humility from Conservative Front Benchers would not go amiss.
	The question of the coincidence, coterminosity or coterminality—call it what one will—of boundaries is important. Several hon. Members came out with the old saw of asking how often people come to constituency surgeries to talk about coterminosity. Unless one is exceptionally unfortunate in one's constituents, they do not—and long may that continue to be the case. People may not talk about that in surgeries, but they often talk about how the Scottish Parliament operates, and there is a feeling that it does not operate as well, as clearly or as effectively as it might. I believe that the coincidence of boundaries is part of that. As the hon. Member for Strathkelvin and Bearsden (Mr. Lyons) mentioned, the operation of the list system is also part of that, so we are right to deal with those points in the Bill. The Scottish Affairs Committee was right to identify it as a problem, and we need to find the solution to it.
	I explored with the Leader of the House at last Thursday's business questions whether the long title of the Bill could be altered in order to entertain amendments in Committee that would examine those issues, because the Bill is narrowly and tightly drawn. I have to say that the Secretary of State's announcement about the commission today would make that unnecessary—indeed, even unhelpful. The commission is important and I certainly hope that my party will play an active and full part in it.
	My other concern is the movement that I detect among some Labour Members—overtly among Conservative Members—away from proportionality. I believe that proportionality was crucial in selling the Scottish Parliament to the Scottish people. I say that because it was long held in many parts of the country—particularly in the highlands and islands and the borders—that, as my predecessor but one, the late Lord Grimond of Firth once put it, we do not want to be ruled by Glasgow trade unionists and Edinburgh lawyers. He said that, unfortunately, in 1983 when he was speaking in support of my colleague, Jim Wallace, who was then seeking to take over the seat. He was an Edinburgh lawyer, so it was not perhaps the most helpful intervention in the debate, but it does not seem to have done any lasting damage.
	I say in all seriousness that proportionality in the Scottish Parliament means that we must not end up being, to use another expression, the Strathclyde region writ large. That is of supreme importance and any move away from proportionality must be deprecated. It is certainly something that my constituents and I would not countenance supporting. That is why I could not go along with the suggestion in the Scottish Affairs Committee report of having two Members in the Scottish Parliament for each Westminster constituency. Inevitably, in my view, that would have led to the end of proportionality.

Bill Tynan: The hon. Gentleman is deluding himself. I believe that the Scottish electorate is more interested in the delivery of the Scottish Parliament and what it can provide in the way of better governance for the people of Scotland. It is not merely a question of proportional representation.

Alistair Carmichael: I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention, but his view does not concur with what I find in my constituency. My constituents would feel that a Scottish Executive and Parliament dominated by the central belt—and by the party of the central belt that would inevitably follow from first past the post—would, almost by definition, be deficient in its representation of their interests.

David Hamilton: Will the hon. Gentleman take into account the alternative vote system, under which a candidate would require the support of 50 per cent. of the electorate in any constituency? In those circumstances, there would be a mandate by a majority decision.

Alistair Carmichael: I can tell the hon. Gentleman that I believe that AV is preferable to a first-past-the-post system. My concerns remain, however, that in the end it does not produce a Parliament that is truly proportional. As with first past the post, there is a bigger element of accident and happenstance. It could be more proportional, but it almost certainly would not be. In order to secure a more proportional system, one needs larger constituency sizes. That is the fundamental difficulty with the hon. Gentleman's point.

Rosemary McKenna: I agree that the element of proportional representation was an important part of persuading people, particularly in the periphery of Scotland, to vote in favour of having a Scottish Parliament. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that removing proportionality now would be viewed as a very cynical exercise?

Alistair Carmichael: Cynical is putting it mildly. It would perhaps be kind to say that about it. I believe that with the passage of time and after learning from experience, we sometimes forget the importance of proportionality as part of the overall constitutional convention programme. What I am trying to achieve tonight is firmly to put that element back into the debate because it is so important. We should remember why we took certain decisions in the first place.

Andrew Turner: I do not seek to upset either way the proportional element in the current arrangements, but could the hon. Gentleman explain how having four regions using proportional representaiton for members of Parliament across the central belt reduces the dominance of the central belt on the proceedings of the Scottish Parliament?

Alistair Carmichael: No, I cannot because I have no idea what the hon. Gentleman is talking about. I just do not understand his logic at all. If this does not help him, he can try to intervene again of course, but I am trying to explain that the majority of people in Scotland—or certainly the largest element of people in Scotland—live in the central belt, which is why the majority of first-past-the-post seats are there, and that that tends to deliver a dominance under the first-past-the-post system.

Brian Wilson: Perhaps I can help the hon. Gentleman. I think that the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr. Turner) makes a perfectly valid point because proportional representation as expressed through the Scottish Parliament does not reduce the dominance of the central belt—what it does is make political representation in the central belt more diffuse—but I, for one, having some interest in highlands and islands affairs, would seriously question whether the net effect is beneficial to the highlands and islands.

Alistair Carmichael: Ah, well, I can understand the point when the hon. Gentleman puts it like that—I think that we speak the same language. The danger is that we think of the central belt as a unified lump. Of course it is not; there is a diversity of opinion in the central belt, as there is throughout the highlands and islands as well. The fact that, under the first-past-the-post system, the central belt tends to return a preponderance of Labour MPs lies at the heart of the suspicion that exists in other more peripheral parts. It can be argued that things can be done differently or better, but that suspicion will not be overcome by diverting from the proportionality of the Parliament.
	I broadly welcome the commission that the Secretary of State has proposed today. It is a worthy successor to the constitutional convention. It will advance the debate in the spirit and manner in which the constitutional convention was conducted. First, I hope that we will be able to keep the Conservatives and the Scottish nationalists on board because they are an important part of the process. Secondly, I should be interested to hear from the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland what role she envisages for the wider civic Scotland, because the remarkable success of the Scottish Constitutional Convention was shown in the manner in which it managed to include the Churches, the trade unions and other civic bodies. I hope that some of that spirit can be recaptured in the right hon. Gentleman's commission.
	I wish to try to swim against the tide of the debate by briefly saying something about the Bill itself. I felt originally that the manner in which the Bill was drafted was tight and restrictive. I am very pleased that the commission will allow a wider debate to take place, perhaps outwith the Chamber, because politics does not begin and end at the doors at either end of the Chamber; there is a wider political debate to be had outwith. For that reason and with the assurances provided by the commission, I shall be pleased, along with my Liberal Democrat colleagues, to join the Government in the Lobby to support the Bill tonight.

Rosemary McKenna: I align myself with the remarks about the Bill made by the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Carmichael). The Bill, allied to the Secretary of State's statement on the commission, is exactly the outcome that I had hoped for, and it is exactly what the people of Scotland will welcome. I welcome the announcement on the commission's remit, particularly the reference to the four different types of voting systems that will be possible in Scotland under local government legislation. People will want to look at that very carefully, and there will be an opportunity to do so, given the commission's remit. I look forward to hearing the announcement about the commission's membership and about when it will start and when it will report.
	The Secretary of State also indicated that the remit would include looking at voter participation. That is also important. I am not absolutely certain that the reduction in turnout is caused by the different types of electoral system. Unfortunately, the reduction in turnout is happening all over the world, and we as politicians have to address ourselves to finding out why that is so. Perhaps part of the reason is related to confusion about the voting systems. I am not absolutely convinced about that, but we must find out why that is happening.
	The Secretary of State also announced that the relationship between public bodies, MPs and MSPs would be considered. Some people appear to think that that will create confusion. I cannot say from my experience that it has caused confusion in my local authority, where the relationship between the local authority, the MP, the MSP, the various public bodies—the health boards and so on—seems to involve a good dialogue. However, those relationships should be looked at if they are an issue in some areas.
	On the representation by different tiers of elected Members, perhaps the Select Committee on Scottish Affairs report on multi-layered democracies could be borne in mind. I shall not quote the report, but I am certain that the Committee was convinced that there was absolutely no problem in working multi-layered democracies and that different levels of representation were perfectly acceptable in those countries in the world where it happens. For example, Germany, France and Spain have different tiers of government and various types of devolution in different areas. I hope that that report will also inform the commission.
	I should like to tell hon. Members about one of my constituents when I was a lowly district councillor and we had several tiers of representation. She came to me to complain about an issue. When I was unable to respond favourably to the complaint, she went to the regional councillor. The regional councillor was unable to solve the problem, so she went to the Member of Parliament. The Member of Parliament was unable to respond to the problem, so she went to the Member of the European Parliament. Ultimately, she insisted that the only way to resolve the problem was to go to Rome, so she promptly took herself off to Rome to find a higher authority. I do not quite know what response she got, but constituents are well able to find out where to get the right answer to their problems.
	No one thinks that the voting method for the Scottish Parliament is wonderful, but we must remind ourselves why we are where we are. The Scotland Act 1998 was taken almost entirely from the constitutional convention. While some did not expect the similarity to be so close, it turned out to be very close because it was created by consensus. That consensus was important because it ensured the inclusion in the Labour party general election manifesto of the proposal to legislate for a Scottish Parliament, after a referendum, in two years. The consensus was also important in ensuring a massive majority in favour of the Parliament in the referendum. I agree completely with the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland, who said that that was an important part of achieving that consensus not only in the central belt, but around the periphery in Scotland.
	Everyone obviously agrees about keeping the number of MSPs at 129, but let us not forget for a minute that the Conservatives say in their amendment that they want to
	"address the proliferation of politicians in Scotland."
	May I remind them that in 1996 there were more politicians in Scotland than there are at the moment? In 1996, the Conservative local government reform removed more politicians than the Conservatives suggest in their amendment. I am not exactly sure of the numbers, but about 400 councillors were lost to the Scottish electorate.
	Their proposal is now to take away 20 or so MPs, but they take us nowhere near the reduction that took place then. However, they are consistent. The proposal has nothing to do with the Scottish Parliament; it is just about reducing people's ability to be represented by whom they want under a system that allows for far greater representation.

Peter Duncan: Our beliefs are consistent, and the hon. Lady will accept that they are consistent with our view that small government is better for the Scottish people. That is why we believe that we need a smaller Scottish Parliament and that the same agenda can be delivered by 108 rather than 129 Members.

Rosemary McKenna: The Conservatives certainly had small government when they had four Ministers running the then Scottish Office in the run-up to the 1997 general election and in the preceding 18 years. They performed no great service to the people of Scotland and that is why the Conservatives lost so resoundingly in 1997 and ended up without a single Member of Parliament. Unfortunately, small government did not work then.
	We have to consider the boundaries, but I do not think that they matter all that much—certainly not in the short term. People quickly get to know their parliamentarian or councillor; they can certainly find out who they are by visiting the local library. I would like to think that everybody knows who is their Member of Parliament, who is their local councillor or who is their MSP. However, that is not the case. Not as many people as we think know who we are.

David Hamilton: They do in Midlothian.

Rosemary McKenna: Apart from in Midlothian, where my hon. Friend insists that every member of the electorate knows him. However, as long as the proposals are based on local government boundaries—which they are—we do not have anything to worry about.
	The fact that a commission is being set up is important. I hope that it will allow for representations from all civic Scotland. People feel that they played a part in setting up the Scottish Parliament and it is important that they feel a part of amending it. I hope that the trade unions, the churches and local government will all be included in the consultation process and have an opportunity to express their views.
	Let us never forget that the Scottish Labour party gave Scotland the Parliament that the people wanted and had asked for. The Scottish Labour party created it. One of the most important elements of proportional representation is that it allowed us to have a better gender-balanced Parliament than almost any Parliament in the world. The Liberal Democrats could have made the position even better if they had kept to their original agreement when they said that they would have a gender-balanced list. Unfortunately, they did not have such a list and the Labour party was the only party to present one. However, the pressure and impetus that that created meant that there were more women in the Scottish Parliament than in any other legislature. I know that some of my colleagues may not agree with that, but that was a great step forward even though the nationalists and the Tories did not take part.

Jimmy Hood: Not only do I agree with my hon. Friend, but I want to help to get more women into the Scottish Parliament. Perhaps she will consider supporting an amendment in Committee to have two Members for each constituency. We could have one woman and one man and that would improve the gender balance throughout Scotland. As she says, the other political parties have not responded, but the Labour party has. Such an amendment would be an excellent idea in achieving a better gender balance.

Rosemary McKenna: I cannot support two Members for each constituency simply because that removes any element of proportionality. There is not a Parliament or a legislature in the world that would be created today in which one would have a first-past-the-post system. We live in a democracy, and we understand that democracy is not delivered by a first-past-the-post system. I am not talking about changing existing systems; I am talking about the system that we created for the Parliament in Scotland.
	Like everyone else, I and my Member of the Scottish Parliament were followed about by a list MSP—

Russell Brown: You were being stalked.

Rosemary McKenna: I was not being stalked. The list MSP spent the entire proceeds of his advertising budget and was in my constituency nearly all the time, but we beat him in the election. We beat such people politically, and I hope that we shall continue to do that.

Russell Brown: As I said to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, I had to leave earlier to attend another meeting, but I am sure that people have expressed grave concerns throughout the debate about list Members who seem to float around the system. Some land on a specific patch and concentrate on that. However, an even greater issue is now beginning to surface. List Members of the Scottish Parliament are being selected for the next election and they go around the patch in some form of legitimate fashion saying that they are still Members of the Scottish Parliament, which they are. However, they are doing nothing more than campaigning for the next general election with the taxpayers picking up the cost.

Rosemary McKenna: My hon. Friend has just demonstrated that the issue is about politicians. The subject is not discussed in the pubs and clubs in Cumbernauld and Kilsyth. Constituents have yet to come to me and say that they wish to make a complaint. However, if we try to impose change without proper consultation, the issue will be quickly raised. I worked with the convention through my involvement with local government and I am certain that the whole issue of proportionality was crucial in helping us to deliver the Scottish Parliament. I agree that the system is not perfect, but it is not worrying people in our constituencies. I have always supported proportional representation and nothing that has happened has persuaded me otherwise.

Bill Tynan: My hon. Friend referred to the list candidate for the Scottish Parliament for Cumbernauld and Kilsyth. The way to defeat such individuals is by working hard and making sure that we beat them at the poll. Does she accept that that person is not in the Scottish Parliament because the Scottish National party put him so far down the list that he could not win a seat?

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. We are going a little wide of the debate.

Rosemary McKenna: My hon. Friend again demonstrates that this is a matter that politicians talk about. It is not discussed in our constituencies. People quickly suss out what is happening. I repeat that we defeat such candidates politically and not by complaining about the system.
	I welcome the fact that the commission will have an opportunity to consider these issues. I am sure that many people will wish to give evidence and to express their views. I suspect that civic Scotland wants a proportional system that delivers a Parliament that reflects society. A first-past-the-post system does not deliver a Parliament that reflects society or gives the views of the people due credence. Every vote must matter, and a system of proportional representation is the one to do that.

Irene Adams: Does my hon. Friend agree that every vote does not matter at the moment? In the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Anniesland (John Robertson), 77,000 votes were cast for the Labour party list but not one member was elected. However, someone from a minority party who received 10,000 votes was elected.

Rosemary McKenna: The votes are cumulative. Under the current system, a Labour Member has no hope of getting elected in the constituency of the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Carmichael), but there is hope under proportional representation.
	The Scottish Parliament is settling down, and recent opinion polls show a great deal of support for it and its achievements. Given the views expressed today, I hope that a consensus is reached, but I do not envy the work of the commission. How on earth can consensus be achieved? I wish the Secretary of State luck.

Alan Reid: I welcome the Bill, which will keep 129 MSPs in the Scottish Parliament, although I wish that it were much better. I also wish that the Bill were more wide ranging and that we could table amendments to it relating to different electoral systems. I also welcome the Secretary of State's announcement of a commission to consider changes to the electoral system for the Scottish Parliament.
	Despite welcoming both the Bill, which keeps 129 MSPs, and the commission, which will review the electoral system, I regret the sequence of events that has taken us to this situation at this time. The commission should have been set up one year ago, when the Secretary of State's predecessor made her statement in the House in December 2002. The commission should have started its work after the 2003 Scottish parliamentary elections, because at that point we had seen the electoral system work for a full Parliament and had been through two elections. If the commission had been set up then, we could have discussed its recommendations in this debate.

Peter Duncan: The hon. Gentleman suggests that the commission should have been set up a year ago when the then Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Airdrie and Shotts (Mrs. Liddell), made the announcement. Does he not take on board the powerful point made by the hon. Member for Cunninghame, North (Mr. Wilson) that the commission is being set up to deal with a problem that has not yet occurred? If the commission had been set up then, the problem would have been one year away. The problem of coterminousity and lack of boundary consistency is not yet there to deal with. Why should the commission have been set up one year ago?

Alan Reid: When we envisage a problem, we should take steps to stop it arising. If I understand the hon. Gentleman's argument, he wants to wait until we have a problem, and only then take steps to deal with it.
	The Scottish Parliament has undoubtedly been successful—we have a consensus on that point and no party wants to abolish it. It has passed many Bills because we needed to catch up. For many years, there had not been parliamentary time at Westminster to pass the number of the Bills required in Scotland to keep Scots law up to date.
	When considering the numbers, it is important to remember that the Scottish Parliament is a single chamber. Earlier, Conservative Members were calculating the number of elected politicians in Scotland and comparing that figure with England. However, they all failed to take into account the many unelected politicians in Westminster in the House of Lords. The number of people scrutinising legislation in Westminster is far greater than the number of MPs alone.

Alistair Carmichael: On the subject of the large number of unelected members in the other place, does it strike my hon. Friend as strange that Conservative Members' enthusiasm for reducing the number of politicians never extends to that end of the building?

Alan Reid: My hon. Friend makes an excellent point, which I wholeheartedly endorse.
	Since the Scottish Parliament has a single chamber, its Committees play an important role both in scrutinising the Executive and in improving the quality of legislation. The Committees already have a full work load, and a cut in the number of MSPs would either greatly increase that, or reduce the effectiveness of the Committees. The recent Scotland Office consultation on whether the current number of MSPs should be retained also came out heavily in favour of keeping the number at 129.
	I welcome the Government's decision to introduce the Bill rather than allowing the Scotland Act 1998 to reduce the number of MSPs to 106 at the 2007 election. However, I agree with the hon. Members who say that the Government's method, if it is ever implemented, will lead to confusion. It will have an impact only at the 2007 election, and if, as the Secretary of State has promised, the commission proceeds speedily, the Government and Parliament could have accepted its recommendations before the 2007 election. The legislation that we pass tonight may never come into effect, because it will be overtaken by events.
	I also agree with many of the comments about the list system. Although constituents do not use the word "coterminousity" when they discuss the issue, as hon. Members have pointed out, they raise the subject in other ways. Obviously, my constituency and the Scottish Parliament constituency currently share the same boundaries and the same name—Argyll and Bute. However, Argyll and Bute council covers a larger area than my constituency. The current parliamentary boundaries were drawn up under the previous local government boundaries, and follow the former local government district of Argyll and Bute, which was abolished in 1996.
	If the Bill has its full effect and is not overtaken by the commission, the current Scottish Parliament constituency of Argyll and Bute will survive until 2011, despite being based on the boundary of a district council that was abolished in 1996. It is difficult to explain that situation to my constituents. Because the constituency boundary does not follow the council boundary, I spend a great deal of time explaining to constituents that my constituency does not cover the whole of Argyll and Bute and that people who live in the parts of Argyll and Bute council area that are not covered by the Argyll and Bute constituency are represented by the hon. Member for Dumbarton (Mr. McFall).

Michael Weir: Will the hon. Gentleman accept that that will be the case in many situations? There are parts of three different local authorities in my constituency; under the new scheme, the new Angus constituency will not cover the whole of Angus, parts of which will go into two Dundee seats. The same problems will occur whatever system is selected.

Alan Reid: There will certainly be an element of confusion, but it does not need to be this confusing. For example, the two Aberdeen, Norths and two Aberdeen, Souths will follow different boundaries, as will the two Dundee, Easts and the two Dundee, Wests. That is a recipe for total confusion.
	The election of the Parliament on a proportional basis has been a proven success—and I say that as a member of a party that has derived little benefit from the top-up lists. They have produced only four Liberal Democrat MSPs compared with 13 elected in the constituencies. The main beneficiaries of the top-up lists have been not the Liberal Democrats but the Scottish National party and the Tories, but it is only right for SNP and Tory voters to have fair representation in the Scottish Parliament.
	List MSPs do not have a properly defined role. They invariably cherry-pick, either by concentrating all their efforts on one constituency and setting themselves up as shadow constituency MSPs, or by taking up issues that provide them with a public profile, leaving constituency MSPs to do the less high-profile casework on behalf of individual constituents.
	One unexpected outcome of the top-up list system has been that because the party that gains the most votes inevitably wins more than its fair share of constituency seats, and because most of the top-up list seats therefore go to the smaller parties, the bulk of the Ministers are drawn from the constituency MSPs. That leaves the list MSPs with little to do. The constituency MSPs have all the constituency work to do and make up the vast majority of Ministers. That was an unforeseen effect, but now that we can see the system in operation, we can see that as one reason for changing it.
	I hope that the commission's remit will allow it to consider only proportional systems. It should choose a system under which all MSPs are elected using the same method, and avoid having two separate categories of MSP as we have at the moment. The obvious choice is the single transferable vote—STV—system. That could be implemented by pairing new Westminster constituencies, each pair to form a multi-Member constituency for the Scottish Parliament. Each of those multi-Member constituencies could then elect four or five MSPs.
	That would mean that all MSPs were on the same footing and, importantly, that the voters would decide who was elected from each party—unlike the present list system, where the party members effectively decide who is elected by determining the order of the names on the lists. The STV system would also have the advantage that Scottish Parliament and local council elections held on the same day could be held using the same voting system. I hope that the commission will recommend STV.
	I shall vote to give the Bill a Second Reading because it keeps the Parliament at 129 Members, but I regret that the Government have framed it so tightly that it excludes consideration of alternative electoral systems.

Bill Tynan: At this time of night it is often difficult to find something new to say, but I shall try my best. I can understand why Opposition Members want to pursue a PR system, which is in their interests, but as a Labour Member I take the view that if we are winning, I want to continue to win and to deliver for the people whom I represent. That is a clear difference between Opposition Members and me.
	This could be a debate for anoraks, looking at different systems and discussing which way to go. So far as I can see, it is a debate for the chattering classes. I think that there was a demand for a Scottish Parliament because the people in Scotland were so fed up with voting constantly for a Labour Government and losing during the 18 years of Conservative rule, and of seeing the damage that the Conservatives did to ordinary people in Scotland, that they gave up and decided, "We're never going to win a general election, so let's have a Scottish Parliament. Let's have something new that will protect the people of Scotland." That is one reason why civil society and members of the Labour party were at one in trying to establish a Scottish Parliament.
	I welcome what the Secretary of State has said today, but, as he said, we have to look at the system and at the issues that the Select Committee on Scottish Affairs has raised. I commend the Committee for its report, which covers several issues very well. When it was published on 3 February there was much interest in it, especially in view of today's debate. The report's third recommendation is that the commission should start work as soon as possible and that whatever it recommends should be implemented, through this Parliament, in time for the 2007 election. We should adopt that recommendation. I am delighted, as were the majority of the members of the Committee, with its work. Its findings will allow the Secretary of State—and, I am now told, the First Minister—to implement the commission's decisions through this Parliament.
	However, I have a confession to make. I was a list member in 1999, when the Labour party placed me first in the list for Central Scotland. I was lucky—I escaped and am here instead of in the Scottish Parliament. When I was standing, I could not campaign, because we were concentrating on the first-past-the-post candidate in the constituency—and, I am delighted to say, we were successful in securing his election.
	The literature that we produced for the electorate targeted the first-past-the-post seat and did not target the list candidate. There were eight of us on the list, which was sent to constituents, who then had to make a decision. The Labour party achieved 130,000 votes that evening, and the Member who was elected to the Scottish Parliament won 17,000 votes. I have always thought that the list system was unfair—I am not just saying so because I was a list member. However, my experience demonstrated graphically that it was certainly not the way in which we should proceed.
	The explanatory notes to the Bill say:
	"The Scotland Act 1998 provides for the constituencies of the Scottish Parliament to be the same as those for the United Kingdom Parliament, except . . . Orkney and Shetland."
	They continue:
	"There are currently 73 constituency Members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs) and 56 regional list MSPs. The Act also provides that the Boundary Commission for Scotland when reviewing the Westminster constituencies should use the same (larger) electoral quota as used in England. This is likely to reduce . . . to 59."
	The Minister should take note of the fact that the boundary commission is currently examining the English constituencies for numbers. If we are going to apply the Scottish parliamentary model to Westminster it is likely that there will shortly be another reduction in the number of MPs representing Scotland. It would be better to introduce proposals to reduce the number of Scottish MPs when proposed boundary changes are made in England, Wales and Scotland. There are now 129 MSPs, but we are reducing the number of MPs from Scotland. I believe that change should have been effected on a broader basis.
	As politicians, we should look at the genuine opportunity presented by our debate. If we are to improve government structures we should do so not on the basis of whether there are 59 MPs or 129 MSPs, but on the basis of how best to deliver for the people whom we represent. The Scottish people were excited about the Scottish Parliament, and may have had huge expectations about what it could deliver. To some extent, they have been disappointed—even the First Minister has said so. However, the Scottish Parliament will grow and deliver for the people of Scotland. It will settle down and take the direction that it should have taken originally, and I am delighted that we set it up.
	Participation and the involvement of the people are crucial. I do not believe the electorate are interested in the numbers, whether they are 59 or 129. They are interested in what we can deliver. When I was doing research for our debate I came across a press release:
	"A Gallup survey . . . last week painted a very depressing picture of the way people in Britain today feel about their country and its institutions. It revealed a significant and worrying loss of confidence in Parliament, in our justice system, and in the way the country is governed. Only a tiny number of those questioned believed . . . that Britain is a country at ease with itself.
	I have no hesitation in saying there is an undeniable and pressing need for constitutional reform in this country. Undeniable because—as I hope to demonstrate—our structures and institutions are clearly failing properly to represent the people they were set in place to serve. And pressing because of the mounting sense of disenchantment and cynicism amongst the people of this country about our political system, a deeply disturbing trend that must be checked if we are to secure the future health of our democracy."
	That was part of a speech by John Smith in 1993. He believed that establishing a Scottish Parliament and a Welsh Parliament was the way forward.
	I would question whether we have been successful. Do the same problems still exist even with the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly in place? It is important that we examine not only structures but what we are doing as politicians to create the impetus for people to be involved in the political process. At the last Scottish parliamentary election in my constituency, 46 per cent. of the electorate turned out. That must be of concern to every Member in this place and to every politician in Scotland.

Angus Robertson: I wish to understand the hon. Gentleman's train of thought a little better. He has talked about ways of galvanising the electorate to help deliver aspirations in the run-up to the Scottish Parliament elections. Does he share the view of the majority expressed in an opinion poll last week for The Herald, which indicated that an overwhelming number of people in Scotland want to see greater power exercised by the Scottish Parliament?

Bill Tynan: Out of the consensus of the Scottish Constitutional Convention came the opportunity for consensus and the establishment of the Scottish Parliament. The SNP had no part in that consensus. It is regrettable that it did not take the opportunity to be involved. I understand that Sir David Steel is asking for another convention to be set up. I understand also that the leaders of the SNP are now saying, "Let's go for it." Obviously, their intention is to try to achieve more power for the Scottish Parliament. If we are talking about bedding down a Parliament and retaining 129 Members to see how it goes by allowing the parliament time, that should be our approach to the entire process. We should take our time and then decide what is necessary.
	We should carefully consider where we are on these matters. I shall vote with the Government, but I hope that the opportunity will arise in Committee for us to be involved in discussions and amendments to improve the Bill. That will be essential. I recognise that we have some serious problems. I also recognise that we must deal with the issues that are before us. I believe that the Bill needs amendment, and I look forward to that process.

Andrew Turner: I sympathise with the hon. Member for Hamilton, South (Mr. Tynan) in the effect of the different electoral systems on his political fortunes. I am sure that he would agree that he is better off as a Member of this place than as a list Member of the Scottish Parliament.
	I do not feel strongly about all of the Bill, and neither do my constituents. However, there are aspects of it about which they feel particularly strongly, and I wish to represent them on those points.
	First, I wish to address a remark that was made earlier, which was that the constitutional settlement in Scotland was a done deal. The hon. Member for Clydesdale (Mr. Hood) suggested that we were in danger of unpicking the devolution settlement. The Bill certainly attempts to unpick that settlement—let there be no doubt about that. As the hon. Member for Cunninghame, South (Mr. Donohoe) said, one of the aspects of the settlement was the number of Members of the Scottish Parliament, and that is being unpicked by the Bill.
	The Secretary of State used the word "consensus" twice. I picked him up on that, but I never received an answer, so I repeat my point so that the Under-Secretary can reply later. The first time the right hon. Gentleman referred to a consensus, and the second time to a consensus in Scotland with regard to the future of the 129 MSPs. When I challenged him he said that a consensus is what is arrived at in this House. On that basis, we have a consensus on foundation hospitals and on tuition fees. I do not think that that is a very good description of a consensus. The description in the Scottish Constitutional Convention referred to by the hon. Member for Paisley, North (Mrs. Adams), albeit not a consensus to which I would have subscribed had I lived in Scotland at the time, was a much better description of a consensus than that furnished by the right hon. Gentleman.
	There is a great concern—if one reads the Select Committee's report carefully it is even easier to feel such concern—that the Bill is a Trojan horse to retain the number of MSPs and, subsequently, use that as an excuse for retaining the number of Scottish Members of this House. I was glad to hear the Secretary of State come near to denying that that was his intention, but that was certainly the recommendation, as I read it. If one retains the number of MSPs and coterminosity, the only consequence can be to retain the number of Scottish Members of this House, and that, it appeared to me, is what the report was recommending.

Irene Adams: The report recommended that the Westminster Members be reduced in number, but that the commission to be set up should find a way of making coterminous boundaries with the 129 at Edinburgh and the 59 at Westminster.

Andrew Turner: I thank the hon. Lady for that explanation. I shall have to think rather more carefully about how such a commission will be able to do that, but I am grateful for her guarantee on that.
	The best argument in favour of the retention of coterminosity was that put forward by the hon. Member for Cunninghame, North (Mr. Wilson)—it is that of confusion. That was repeated by the hon. Member for Argyll and Bute (Mr. Reid). He made a long speech, much of which I agreed with. He announced at the end that he would vote for the Bill, which I found rather curious, but he repeated the point made by the hon. Member for Cunninghame, North. I checked, and 21 constituencies would have the same name but different boundaries were the Bill to be enacted, and one constituency would have the same boundaries but a different name.

Alan Reid: A lot will arise from the Bill with which I disagree, but I will support it tonight because it will result in a better situation than would be the case without it. The important thing is to keep the number of MSPs at 129, which a unicameral Parliament and a strong Committee system requires.

Andrew Turner: I understand the hon. Gentleman's motivation in voting for the Bill; it is to maintain the present number of MSPs. I do not agree with it, but I understand his motivation for it. Incidentally, it was 20 constituencies, not 21—I apologise to the House. But I see no magic in the 129 figure, and so far no one has been able to explain it to me. I accept that the Scottish Parliament is unicameral and that it has a strong Committee system, but it has less to do than the Westminster Parliament has to do for England. Yet it seems to be necessary for Scotland to have five times the representation in one Parliament or another that my constituents have, and I simply do not understand that. That is the point that is talked about in the pubs and clubs on the Isle of Wight. It is not coterminosity that is talked about; it is the position of Scottish electors compared with that of English electors, and, most particularly, English electors who happen to live in the Isle of Wight.

Irene Adams: The hon. Gentleman is clearly talking once again about the West Lothian question, but what he seems to have failed to understand throughout the years of debate is that that question was never one for the people of Scotland. Rather, it was a question for the people of England and a question of how they addressed their home affairs. If they chose to address them in this Parliament, it would be as part of a UK Parliament. If they chose not to do so, they would need regional assemblies to address those problems.

Andrew Turner: There is more than one way of skinning a cat. The method that I think most of my constituents would prefer is one whereby English Members of this Parliament deal with English matters. I can see absolutely no objection to that argument. I do not understand—

Mark Lazarowicz: rose—

Andrew Turner: Doubtless the hon. Gentleman will tell me why Labour Members find that proposition so offensive.

Mark Lazarowicz: I am intrigued by the idea of pubs and clubs in the Isle of Wight tuning their TVs to the Parliament channel as we discuss the Scottish Parliament (Constituencies) Bill. I suggest to the hon. Gentleman that one answer to his dilemma is the establishment of a powerful regional assembly covering his part of the country. I understand that he is against that proposal, but whatever the degree of criticism that has now crept in about the Scottish Parliament, the degree of public support for it shown in the opinion polls is higher than for the Westminster Parliament.

Andrew Turner: That might well be true, but it is the case because Scotland has an identity as a nation, whereas I doubt that the hon. Gentleman could even say in which region my constituency lies, and neither could most of my constituents. They do not identify with the so-called regions of England and they do not wish to have a regional parliament or assembly, whether it is in Guildford, Woking or Milton Keynes. That is not something that they want or that should be imposed on them. I am glad that there will be a referendum if there is any proposal that such an assembly should be established, as I am sure that we will vote against it.
	The point is that, at the moment, hon. Members on both sides of the House who represent English constituencies are covering a range of activities. I am fortunate because I represent more than 100,000 people; indeed, I believe that I am unique in that respect in this Parliament. We cover a range of responsibilities, whether they relate to England or the UK, and we accept that it is for the Scots to have a Scottish Parliament if they choose and that it is for them to decide to have five Members of one Parliament or another for every one Member of one Parliament or another who represents the Isle of Wight. That is their decision, but we do not understand why Scottish MPs seem to object to English matters being dealt with by English Members of this House. I am not talking about banishing them from having any say in United Kingdom affairs—

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. In debating the Bill, we are discussing the number of constituencies, rather than responsibilities.

Andrew Turner: I accept that entirely, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I want now to talk about one aspect of representation of those constituencies. The Secretary of State represents in the Cabinet not only Scotland, but transport. My constituents would like him to explain why, as Secretary of State for Scotland, he can decide with the support of Members of Parliament from England, Scotland, and Wales and Northern Ireland for that matter, that no subsidies should be given to the ferries that ply across the Solent to my constituency—

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. Again, that is outside the scope of this debate.

Andrew Turner: I was about to say that that is happening while 129 Scottish Members can decide what subsidies are given to the ferries that ply their way to the Scottish islands.

Jimmy Hood: I shall try to rescue the hon. Gentleman and bring him back to the subject of the debate. Does he understand that he will be going into the Lobby this evening to vote on a Bill that is applicable only to Scotland, and not to England or Wales? If he thinks that that is okay—and I think it is okay—why was he criticising Scottish MPs for doing the same thing a fortnight ago?

Andrew Turner: I will vote on the Bill because it is a United Kingdom measure. Nobody has tried to argue that the Bill is not a UK measure, whereas many people—particularly residents of the Isle of Wight—argue that ferry subsidies to the Isle of Wight is not a Scottish measure and that Scottish MPs should not be entitled to vote upon it. I see that you are keen that I should not go too much further down that road, Madam Deputy Speaker, so I will not.
	There is one other point that I should like to make about the value or otherwise of MSPs. I understand that the average cost of an MSP is £317,317 per annum, while the average running cost per member of this Parliament is a mere £5,000 more, yet there are so many more MSPs per Scottish elector than there are Members of the UK Parliament per UK elector. I accept that we have peers as well, but most are very cheap; some of them come free. We get good value from the other place, we get good value from this place, but we get exceptionally poor value from MSPs.

Alex Salmond: Is the hon. Gentleman's supreme constitutional point that if MSPs were prepared to accept no salary, he would have no objection to however many of them there were?

Andrew Turner: It is not, as it happens. It is just—[Interruption.]

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. I have previously reminded the hon. Gentleman of the scope of the debate. I do so once more; perhaps he will now refer to the content of the Bill and the debate.

Andrew Turner: My point was that the number of Members of this Parliament per elector produced better value than the number of electors proposed by the Bill per MSP. It is not a supreme constitutional issue, but it is an issue with which I would be concerned were I a Scottish elector. I am not a Scottish elector, but I do not feel that that should influence the decision one way or the other.
	When the Government introduce legislation, they should not turn it upside down within three or four years, which is what I object to most about the Bill. The Government do that all the time, of course. They have done it recently, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the Opposition remarked at Prime Minister's Question Time last week. It is embarrassing that they do so because it indicates that they have not thought through legislation. Indeed, the hon. Member for Cunninghame, South said that we had sleepwalked into this position and that we did not look at the details of the legislation.
	As a result of the Bill, I would like us to decide not to change the current settlement. By making a change, the Government are accepting that it is open to us, and to anyone, to propose changes to the settlement. If we are entitled to propose changes to the settlement, we who represent English electors will seek to open the West Lothian question.
	I do not believe that more politicians mean better services. I do not believe that my constituents believe that, and I would be surprised if Scottish constituents believed that. That is why I will vote against the Bill tonight.

John Robertson: I am aware of the time and will do my best to leave sufficient time for the hon. Member for Edinburgh, West (John Barrett).
	In an attempt to stop Members intervening to ask who I have talked to lately, I say that I base my input tonight on the debate that I have had with members of my party and of my electorate and on my experience overall in campaigning, since 1978, for a Scottish Parliament.
	The first question I asked myself when I was putting my speech together is, "Why open the Act?" I asked the same question when I made my submission to the previous Secretary of State for Scotland.
	I have had great difficulty in coming to terms with that, so I have great sympathy with Opposition Members. I could mention private conversations that I had with the late Donald Dewar, but I will not do that—instead, I will quote from what he said at the time, which can be read in Hansard by any Member who wishes to do so. When the House of Lords tabled an amendment on whether 129 MSPs should remain for ever, he said:
	"In the White Paper, we made it clear that the size of the Scottish Parliament would change to take account of changes at Westminster so as to maintain common boundaries.
	I should reassure the House that the Government have thought long and hard about the implications for the Parliament of a reduction in its size. We do not believe that such a reduction will make the Parliament less able to carry out its key roles in scrutinising effectively the Scottish Administration's work and enacting legislation."—[Official Report, 11 November 1998; Vol. 319, c. 381.]
	Suddenly, we find that the Government have changed their mind about that. Having said unreservedly that they could conduct business in the Scottish Parliament with fewer than 129 MSPs, we now find ourselves faced with a fait accompli, which, regretfully, I shall have to go along with. That does not mean that I am fully minded to walk through the Lobby with my party tonight—I have still to make that final decision. I will not vote with the Opposition, however: I could never walk through the Lobby with the Conservatives, and my father would turn in his grave if I did so.

Peter Duncan: I am sorry to point out something that might be too difficult for the hon. Gentleman to contemplate, but to assist him in his dilemma, I remind him that in the Select Committee on Scottish Affairs he voted with me in order to implement the Scotland Act 1998. I wonder whether he could consider doing so tonight.

John Robertson: I thank the hon. Gentleman for his contribution. I do not know how he conducts his business in Select Committee, but I take the view that I am there to represent the whole House, so I do not consider issues along party political lines, and vote as such. Obviously, other Members do not do the same.
	If we are going to pass the Bill—as we obviously are, because the vote of one Member from Glasgow, Anniesland will not make a big difference—it is regrettable that it was not undertaken properly. As many Members said, there is a great deal in the 1998 Act that needs to be sorted. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State talked about the commission. That is a very good idea, and it is an even better idea to bring it forward immediately. When my right hon. Friend was asked when it will be implemented, he did not answer. That is of paramount importance in getting rid of any anomalies that may be in the system before the next Scottish Parliament elections in 2007, which is my No. 1 priority in terms of supporting the Bill in future.
	The hon. Member for Rutland and Melton (Mr. Duncan), who unfortunately is not in his place, did little to persuade me to support his party tonight—in fact, the Conservatives seem to be suffering from selective amnesia. In the debate in which the late Donald Dewar spoke, the hon. Member for Woodspring (Dr. Fox), who is now chairman of the Conservative party, said:
	"The first thing that will be required to make the Scottish Parliament work properly is stability, but what is guaranteed by what he is defending is instability."—[Official Report, 11 November 1998; Vol. 319, c. 387.]
	This is a role reversal, because my Government are talking about maintaining 129 MSPs, whereas Conservative Members, who supported that at the time of the 1998 Act, now oppose it.
	One would put that down to political—

Jimmy Hood: Chicanery.

John Robertson: Self-interest is one term, but chicanery is a good word and I thank my hon. Friend for it.
	The hon. Member for Galloway and Upper Nithsdale (Mr. Duncan), in an intervention on my hon. Friend the Member for Paisley, North (Mrs. Adams), blamed her for the figure of 129. Again, I revert to what Conservative Members said when the Scotland Act 1998 went through Parliament. They supported that figure; they cannot simply change their minds. They appear to be indulging in very opportunistic politics nowadays. They cannot simply change with the weather: either they have principles or they do not. Someone once said that a Tory cannot eat principles.
	My hon. Friends the Members for Clydesdale (Mr. Hood) and for Paisley, North stole my thunder and my speech. They have obviously been looking over my shoulder. There is no point in telling hon. Members about the number of voters in Glasgow because everybody now knows. My hon. Friend the Member for Clydesdale mentioned the number of list MSPs in his constituency; it was probably fair that he was the first to mention them.
	Why do we need two ballot papers if we have a list system? Why can we not have one ballot paper? The hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond) described the second vote as natural. Having one ballot paper would change that and the Secretary of State should consider it. At least that would mean that 77,000 ballot papers would not be wasted in Glasgow and we might save one tree in the Amazon, if only for a year.
	We should consider the matter seriously. If 77,000 people go through a ballot paper that is half a mile long and to the trouble of casting their vote only to find that it means nothing, that is not democracy. My hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton, South (Mr. Tynan) talked about 130,000 votes.
	Hangers-on and opportunists stand outside my polling stations and tell people, "That's okay, vote Labour. It's your second vote we want. Don't worry about it; you're voting Labour on the first vote, so they won't worry about it." That completely misrepresents the system. I want members of such parties out of the political system because their politics matches their underhandedness.
	My hon. Friend the Member for Strathkelvin and Bearsden (Mr. Lyons) made some excellent points. He mentioned people who come to our surgeries and talk about, in effect, coterminosity. They ask, "Who do I go to?" They might want to discuss health and say, "Mr. Robertson, can you help me with this?" I say, "Yes. Give me your case. I'll take it." I forward it to the MSP. Should I forward it to eight MSPs or give it to my hon. Friend the Member of the Scottish Parliament for Glasgow, Anniesland because I know that he will take it up and attend to it properly? The electorate do not understand the difference between a councillor, an MSP and an MP and they do not care. They care about delivery.
	When I stood for Parliament, it was on a Labour party ticket. The ballot paper did not say, "John Robertson, sometimes a member of the Labour party" or "part-time Labour party member". It said "the Labour party", and I am under no illusions: those three words were the only reason that I got elected.

Bill Tynan: That is why you will vote with the Government.

John Robertson: I may have to do that—my hon. Friend talks me into it.
	Proportionality has been mentioned often and I am sure that the hon. Member for Edinburgh, West will refer to it. I am sorry but I did not go into politics to worry about proportionality. I entered politics to worry about delivering for the people of Glasgow, Anniesland and this country.

Mark Lazarowicz: Will my hon. Friend give way?

John Robertson: Make it quick.

Mark Lazarowicz: Can my hon. Friend tell the House why he was so keen on the Conservatives being able to run this country for 18 years on a minority vote, damaging Scotland in the process? [Interruption.]

John Robertson: I think that somebody said "Judas" from a sedentary position—[Laughter.] My hon. Friend makes a good point, but I do not agree with him, and he knows that.
	I want to mention the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr. Turner), who has done sterling work throughout the evening for the English national party and has told us many times about his 100,000 electors and how that was the equivalent of four seats in Scotland. It would be only four seats in Scotland, as I have just checked the figures, and those would include Orkney and Shetland, Western Isles—I will not say its real name, as I do not speak Gaelic—and Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross. That would take the number to well over 100,000. I do not think that any other Conservative Member has an electorate of that size, so his argument was somewhat disingenuous. I had a bit of sympathy with some of his points until he adopted the English nationalist pose—his party will have to watch that. If the Conservative party wants to be part of the United Kingdom, it must remember that this House represents all the people of this country. It does itself no favours by attacking Scottish Labour Members for voting on legislation that goes through the House.

Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will return to the main debate.

John Robertson: I apologise, Madam Deputy Speaker. I got carried away with the moment. I shall move on quickly, as I have about three speeches to make. It is terrible because we always leave the best to last—in this case, I am not talking about the hon. Member for Edinburgh, West.
	One of my hon. Friends mentioned a referendum. The legislation was put together on a referendum of the Scottish people. Let us be honest—they did not vote because of the system that would be introduced; they voted with their hearts because it was about getting a Scottish Parliament. We all worked hard and we worked together. The SNP, in my constituency in particular, was of great help during the campaign for a yes, yes vote. I have no doubt that that collaboration helped to make the vote bigger than was expected. At the end of day, however, it is important to me that we should not give away power to another party. My job is to represent the people of Glasgow, Anniesland and to do my best for the people of the United Kingdom, but it is also to represent my party and my party's policies. That is what I want to do, and I do not see why we should give that up to another party, so that, in effect, the tail wags the dog. As far as I am concerned, proportionality should not even be on the agenda.

John Barrett: I thank the hon. Member for Glasgow, Anniesland (John Robertson) for not using his last three minutes and allowing me to contribute to the debate at the end of the night.
	There are real problems with the Scottish electoral system. The problem of list MSPs has been highlighted by a number of contributors to the debate. There is also the problem that the electorate are being turned off in droves. Each successive election results in fewer people going to the ballot box. As several Members have said already, however, people are not coming to constituency surgeries raising the issue of coterminosity. People want to see services delivered. When they phone the police by dialling 999, they have no interest in the division from which the police respond. They want a fast and efficient response. If we think that the talk in pubs and clubs around the country is about boundaries, we do so at our peril. What people want to see is a good, effective Scottish Parliament.
	The Scottish Parliament has done a lot of good work in the past five years—I mention just tuition fees and free personal care for the elderly, although I see from some of the press about Mr. Galbraith today, that he does not share my enthusiasm for those policies. The current numerical total in the Scottish Parliament, however, has given it the ability to deal with issues in a way in which this Parliament cannot deal with them. The number 129, which was mentioned earlier by the hon. Member for Paisley, North (Mrs. Adams), is not a magical figure. It was arrived at as a result of discussion and negotiation to make sure that the Scottish Parliament gave the people of Scotland some form of proportionality, so that they received a Parliament that reflected the way in which they voted, and they deserve that.
	If 40 per cent. of people vote for the Government in this Parliament, that gives them a huge majority, although at the last general election the combined votes for the opposition parties exceeded the number of votes for the Labour party by 2 million. The people of Scotland deserve better.

David Taylor: Can the hon. Gentleman name the last Government who had an absolute majority of votes from the United Kingdom electorate?

John Barrett: No.
	The Scottish Parliament is unicameral, so the Committee system is more important than it is here. The MSP in my constituency, Margaret Smith, was a convener of the Health Committee for four years, and during that time managed to take a huge amount of evidence, scrutinise legislation and involve the wider community in the workings of the Parliament. The Parliament already has two Justice Committees. Perhaps the biggest fear relating to a reduction in the number of MSPs is of the impact that such a cull would have on the overall effectiveness of the Committee system. For that reason, among others, the Bill should be welcomed.
	Any break in the link between the Scottish Parliament and Westminster boundaries will present challenges, but those challenges will face parliamentary representatives rather than the general public. I do not think that different boundaries are sustainable in the long term, but I do not subscribe to the other view that chaos will reign supreme when the two Parliaments' boundaries no longer match.
	The long-term solution is, of course, a re-examination of the whole way in which the Scottish Parliament is elected. I would also favour a similar review of the way in which we elect Members to this place. I must confess to being very disappointed with the Scottish Affairs Committee's report. When the Committee announced its inquiry into the break in the link between the two sets of boundaries, it had a real opportunity to produce an imaginative and constructive solution. It is unfortunate that it fell short on both counts. It is a shame that Committee members—apart from the hon. Member for Galloway and Upper Nithsdale (Mr. Duncan), whose party did not want any MSPs in the first place—appeared to pander to party political interests in a way that I thought had long since passed.
	Having two MSPs per constituency with a tiny top-up, as the Committee proposed, could and in all likelihood would entirely destroy the proportional system on which the Scottish Parliament is based. Some Members, both here and in the Scottish Parliament, seem to see the wide range of parties and opinions that exists in the Scottish Parliament as its weakness. I prefer to see it as its strength. I may disagree profoundly with the politics of some of the parties in the Scottish Parliament, but that is democracy, and a fair representation of the way in which people in Scotland have voted.
	The theory that the Scottish Parliament's standing will be enhanced by the creation of a chamber that, in party political terms, would be totally unrepresentative of the wider electorate is fanciful. Surely gerrymandering an electoral system so that one party—we all know which it would be: the Labour party—secured a whopping majority, perhaps 60 or 70 per cent. of the seats with less than 35 per cent. of electors' support, would be massively damaging to Scottish devolution. I urge the Secretary of State to oppose such narrow-minded proposals in every way that he knows.
	If the impact on proportionality does not strike a chord with Labour members of the Committee, perhaps something else will: the fact that their proposals would tear up, at a stroke, the cross-party and cross-society consensus that was struck in the constitutional convention.
	Alternatives to the Bill involve a reduction in the number of list MSPs, or their complete elimination. There is no doubt that list MSPs have caused some difficulty by cherry-picking. My predecessor, Donald Gorrie, produced an excellent document explaining how the single transferable vote could be used to elect MSPs, with the new Westminster boundaries forming coterminous constituencies. I commend that pamphlet to all Members.

Frank Roy: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

John Barrett: I am sorry, but I have only one minute left.
	Mr. Gorrie's pamphlet does not answer all the questions, but it sets out clearly and fairly the foundation on which a PR system could be used to form a Scottish Parliament.
	The Bill is a welcome first step, but we must move forward, so that we improve our relationship with the Scottish Parliament and so that a fair, PR-elected Scottish Parliament can get on with the job of representing the people of Scotland.

Peter Duncan: This has been a good debate on a small Bill. When the Secretary of State opened the debate, he may have talked more about issues that were outside the remit of the Bill than was wise, but the debate has yet again brought the banter on Scottish affairs to the Floor of the House and I am sure that the wider public are delighted. The Scottish Grand Committee is a regular highlight in my diary and I am sure the wider public appreciate the debate this evening.
	The debate has highlighted the scale of the Government's U-turn on the issue. It is useful to reflect on how far the Secretary of State—who, sadly, has not yet rejoined us—has travelled from the position that was put to the electorate in 1997.
	During consideration of Lords amendments, the late Donald Dewar, then Secretary of State for Scotland, said:
	"It is generally accepted that we cannot justify the above-average representation that Scotland enjoys in the House of Commons. It is anticipated, and I accept, that such a review will lead to a reduction in the number of Scottish Members of Parliament, and correspondingly a reduction in the number of constituencies in Scotland. In the White Paper, we made it clear that the size of the Scottish Parliament would change to take account of changes at Westminster so as to maintain common boundaries."—[Official Report, 11 November 1998; Vol. 319, c. 380–81.]
	That shows exactly how far we have travelled in only five years and to see the Secretary of State trying to justify that about-face was somewhat pitiful.

Alex Salmond: The debate has already established that U-turns on this issue are not the sole preserve of the Government. However, I am more concerned about whether the hon. Gentleman is in the right place, as the monitors show that the business in the other place is the Mersey Tunnels Bill.

Peter Duncan: The hon. Gentleman anticipates me. I had been warned of that likelihood, so I am keeping my pager switched on in case I am called away for an urgent Division in another place.
	The Secretary of State has reversed, in totality, one part of the commitment made by Donald Dewar in 1998. We also heard the astonishing revelation that the Secretary of State for Scotland, in whose constituency Scotland's major civil engineering project is being constructed and where £40 million from the taxpayers' budget has been translated into expenditure of £400 million, has never yet visited the Scottish Parliament. That says it all about London Labour. They have turned their back on what has become an embarrassment in their devolution project. They have turned their back on the Scotland Act 1998 and now we find that they have turned their back on the building itself.
	I shall reflect on some of the points that were raised in the debate. The hon. Member for Paisley, North (Mrs. Adams) demonstrated her obsession with the number 129. She said that the consensus on the constitutional convention was 129, yet she seemed unable to transfer that consensus to some of the other issues—she seems willing to break the consensus on them. For example, there was consensus on the list system, but the hon. Lady seems happy to contemplate alternatives, and rightly so. There was consensus on proportionality, but she seems happy to dispense with some of that. Her view of consensus seems somewhat selective.

Irene Adams: The hon. Gentleman may recall that every witness to the Scottish Affairs Committee told us that the consensus was to maintain 129, but that the present system was not the ideal one to achieve it.

Peter Duncan: The hon. Lady is right; there was consistency in terms of the evidence to the Committee in that respect.
	The hon. Member for Clydesdale (Mr. Hood) made a powerful speech in an old-Labour way, if he does not mind me characterising it thus—back to the future, as they say.
	He reflected on the over-governance of Scotland, and on the fact that the two constituencies in Lanarkshire—I should point out that there are three: in addition to Dumfries and Clydesdale, the constituency of Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale also falls within Lanarkshire—have 19 MSPs. I comprehend that particular difficulty. Last week, I attended a public meeting in the lovely village of Wanlockhead, which, for the benefit of viewers of the parliamentary channel, is the highest situated village in Scotland. Some 100 residents of Wanlockhead attended that meeting, along with one Member of Parliament—me. The constituency MSP was also there, along with two regional MSPs. There is some degree of public disquiet at the number of politicians in Scotland.

Jimmy Hood: I hope that the hon. Gentleman was listening to my example of 19 MSPs in one constituency, but he is doubtless aware that the opposite problem is equally bad. In the south of Scotland, each list MSP claims eight constituencies. Is that not just as bad as 19 MSPs claiming one constituency?

Peter Duncan: I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman is falling into the trap of asking me to justify a system that the Labour party created. If he has a problem with the relevant part of the 1998 Act, he should point it out to the Secretary of State for Scotland.
	The right hon. Member for Cunninghame, North (Mr. Wilson)—[Interruption.] I apologise, I meant to say the hon. Member for Cunninghame, North; he has moved to my right, which is a very unusual situation for someone from Saltcoats to be in. He referred to a legislative follow-up to a political fix, and in that regard he got to the essence of today's debate. The Labour party in Scotland has got itself into a fix. It does not know how to dig itself out of an increasingly large hole, and the only way it can do so is to break some of the terms, to which I referred, of Donald Dewar's three-pronged commitment. The interrelationship between the reduction in MPs and MSPs was clear from the very start, and the U-turn in the Bill is also clear for all to see. The hon. Gentleman exposed the twists and turns that the Government have conducted to enforce that compromise, but to judge by the contributions from Government Back Benchers, that compromise still has some way to go before it receives universal acclaim.
	The hon. Member for North Tayside (Pete Wishart) mentioned being out and about in Blairgowrie, which sounds a very attractive prospect. He said that when on such travels, he discovered that people do not care about coterminosity. Although it is not an issue that people come to my surgery to discuss, it will cause concern in due course. The evidence to the Scottish Affairs Committee was crystal clear, and as the hon. Gentleman's colleague, the hon. Member for Angus (Mr. Weir), will know, given that he is a member of the Committee, there is concern about this issue. In reflecting on the second election to the Scottish Parliament, for which less than half the population turned out to vote, we must consider each and every possibility in order to redress declining participation in elections north of the border. It is a mistake for the hon. Member for North Tayside to dismiss coterminosity because it does not suit his party political advantage.

Brian Wilson: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that it is hardly surprising that nobody is concerned about coterminosity while it exists, and that the real test will be whether they are concerned about it when it does not?

Peter Duncan: Absolutely. As it says in the song:
	"You don't know what you've got till it's gone."
	The hon. Member for Strathkelvin and Bearsden (Mr. Lyons) made clear his view that list MSPs do not engage people in the party political process, but I should point out that, of course, the Scotland Act 1998 was not our work. He rightly pointed out that 13 per cent. of the electorate said that they did not vote in the May elections because of confusion. I return to the point made by the hon. Member for Cunninghame, North—we must regard that as a very serious issue.
	The hon. Member for Cumbernauld and Kilsyth (Rosemary McKenna) highlighted the consistent policies of the Scottish Conservative and Unionist party, which I am keen to have put on the parliamentary record. She was the only Government Back Bencher to back the Government, which will mark her out for universal acclaim in the Whips Office tomorrow. I am only sorry that the Secretary of State for Scotland was not in his place and that he missed that uniquely supportive contribution.
	The hon. Member for Glasgow, Anniesland (John Robertson), as Donald Dewar's successor, deserves special mention. He supported me in Committee when I suggested that the simple way of dealing with the problem was to implement the Scotland Act. He saw the wisdom in that suggestion and I am delighted to have his support. He may have had three speeches in mind tonight, but he picked the right one to deliver.
	We are left contemplating tonight the confirmation in today's debate that the Government have finally abandoned the Scotland Act. They have buckled under pressure to the vested interests that see big government and bigger parliaments as ends in themselves. Why else would they have retreated in such dramatic and pathetic fashion from their commitment to reduce the size of the Scottish Parliament before the first Member of the Scottish Parliament has even taken possession of his office in a scandalously expensive project? Why else would they have reversed the view of Ministers during the passage of the 1998 Act that the Parliament could work well with fewer Members?
	I reiterate the words of Henry McLeish, who said that
	"we also believe that the Parliament could operate effectively with fewer Members, and that there are good arguments for maintaining the linkage in constituencies."—[Official Report, 12 May 1998; Vol. 312, c. 224.]
	For the record, that was the former First Minister, who made his views very clear. This is a self-serving consensus of every party, save the Scottish Conservatives, that is determined to inflict more politicians, more bureaucrats and more governance on the hard-pressed taxpayer in Scotland.
	The political landscape in Scotland is entirely clear. All the other parties from which we have heard this evening—albeit that Labour Back Benchers are perhaps a party themselves so there are honourable exceptions—are unable to contemplate a devolved Scotland being governed by any fewer than 129 MSPs. Would it have been any different if the number of MSPs had been 200 or 250? The simple truth is that political parties have become consumed with their own importance and have forgotten the interests of the man on the street. He or she is tired of Scotland's over-governing, as demonstrated by the declining turnout at elections.
	Who would have thought that fewer than one in two people would vote in the second elections to the Scottish Parliament—a Parliament for which, as the Government were so keen to point out, we had been waiting for 300 years. Four years on, fewer than half wanted to participate in the Parliament's re-election. Let there be no doubt that that was partly due to there being too many politicians in Scotland—and the public knowing it.
	The Bill is necessary only because of the Government's commitment in the Scotland Act to reduce the number of Members representing Scottish constituencies. After devolution, there was no longer a need for such wide-ranging Bills applicable only in Scotland. Our distinct legal system meant that our historic over-representation was due to our need to consider large quantities of Scotland-only Bills. That no longer applies and I hope that the Under-Secretary will, in her reply, go further than she and others have done to date and confirm that she expects to have implemented the changes of the boundary commission for Scotland by the end of the Session. With local inquiries complete and no requirement to allocate the new constituencies to Scottish parliamentary regions, there is no further excuse for the Government's failure to commit on that issue.
	Some hon. Members will have sought mischievously to suggest that this issue should not be voted on by hon. Members representing seats other than those in Scotland. I am happy to make it clear for those who are happy to obfuscate that issue, that this is a reserved matter for the UK Parliament, so all hon. Members are entitled to participate on that basis.
	I ask my right hon. and hon. Friends to vote against this unnecessary legislation, which will serve only to keep the number of politicians in Scotland at an inordinately high level. I would be delighted if the hon. Member for Glasgow, Anniesland felt able to do the same. The Scotland Act was designed so that the number of MSPs would fall to 108 as the number of Holyrood constituencies fell in line with Westminster ones. That is precisely what should happen. It is becoming clear that the Conservatives are the only party with respect for the devolved settlement that is seeking neither to tinker with nor to undermine it.
	Although we do not believe that the Scotland Act is set in tablets of stone, we feel that there is no need to open it up at this early stage. Scotland has too many politicians and Scotland's people suffer too much from political interference. The self-serving consensus of Labour, Liberal Democrat and Scottish nationalist politicians, who want to keep it that way, are not only costing taxpayers dear but are putting the electorate off participating in elections.

Anne McGuire: An old phrase came to mind when I listened to the hon. Member for Galloway and Upper Nithsdale (Mr. Duncan) summing up for the Opposition: "Everyone's out of step, except our Jake." It appears that if everyone else in Scotland agrees on something and the Conservative party and its spokesperson do not, it is we who are wrong, and never them.
	I wish to deal with some of the issues that have been raised by quotation before summing up the debate. It is worth reminding the House that when the Scotland Bill was debated in 1998, the hon. Member for Woodspring (Dr. Fox), now co-chairman of Conservative party, said:
	"It is not a good basis on which to start a Parliament—knowing that, very soon afterwards, possibly within its first term and certainly within its second, there will be a major redistribution. It is not a recipe for stability."—[Official Report, 11 November 1998; Vol. 319, c. 387.]
	We can bandy quotations across the Floor of the House tonight, but to be frank I do not think that they add anything to the argument.
	We have had a vibrant, robust and, for the most part, good-humoured debate. Clearly, Parliamentary constituency boundaries and problems about the overlap and respective responsibilities of MPs and MSPs are matters that generate considerable interest among hon. Members—certainly among many of my hon. Friends, and I will look round at them now and again just to make sure that they are still with me.
	Quite a number of comments have been made about devolution itself and the operation of the Scottish Parliament. I will certainly try to pick up on some of the main points, but I want to make a general comment. As a Government, we are committed to modernising this country's political and constitutional agenda, and we are delivering on that modernisation agenda. The success of devolution is that it has undoubtedly brought government closer to the people of Scotland on a wide range of matters that affect their day-to-day lives. Indeed, devolution has made a difference.
	As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State indicated a few hours ago, this short Bill is focused on a relatively straightforward objective: to remove the statutory link in the Scotland Act 1998 between the number of constituencies at Westminster and the number at Holyrood. Before we embarked on this action, we conducted a consultation exercise to take into account the views of many groups and interests across Scotland, and more than 230 replies were received.

Alex Salmond: There is now a Division in the Lords.
	When I asked the Secretary of State at the start of the debate why the matter that we were considering could not be left to the Scottish Parliament, he said that I wanted that to happen because I was a nationalist. Can the hon. Lady tell me of any legislative assembly—devolved or otherwise—anywhere in the world that does not have control over its own electoral system, except that in Scotland?

Anne McGuire: With the greatest respect to the hon. Gentleman, this is a settlement in the United Kingdom, not in any other part of the world. [Interruption.] I am sorry, but he cannot just import what happens in other parts of the world into the United Kingdom. We all understand that the settlement was agreed by the Scottish people.
	I want to reflect for a couple of moments on the extent of the replies that we received before embarking on the Bill. We had 237 responses in total, and 28 from a range of civic bodies, including the Scottish Trades Union Congress, the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations, Unison, the Educational Institute of Scotland, the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, the Scottish Green party, the Scottish Labour party, the Scottish Liberal Democrats, the Scottish National party, the Scottish Socialist party and a variety of other constituency parties or groups.
	All those organisations and individuals support the policy of retaining 129 MSPs in the Scottish Parliament. I hope that we will have no argument about the fact that what we are reflecting today is the views, after consultation, of people in Scotland and the organisations that they are affiliated to or trust.

Peter Duncan: If the balance of the argument is so clear-cut, why was it not foreseen in 1998 when the hon. Lady's colleagues in government made it clear that the number had to remain at 129 before being reduced?

Anne McGuire: I suppose that if I were a generous woman—which I am—I would say that the hon. Member for Woodspring identified the problem. That is one reason why, in the debates in this House and in the other place, we gave ourselves the opportunity to come back and consider what we should do about the numbers in the Scottish Parliament once the legislation that created it had been enacted. We were building a new Parliament in Scotland—not a just physical building, but a whole new way of governance—and it was important to make the best possible attempt to do that in 1998. We did that in good faith. Now that the Parliament has been in place for four or five years, we have consulted, and the overwhelming majority of the responses from civic and political society in Scotland is that 129 MSPs are needed at the moment to organise a Scottish Parliament.
	The hon. Member for North Tayside (Pete Wishart) seems to be obsessed by the boundary commission, but I reiterate once again the Secretary of State's commitment that the Bill will have no impact on our commitment to reducing the number of constituencies represented at Westminster. Action will be taken on that front once the boundary commission has reported with its recommendations to my right hon. Friend.
	As my right hon. Friend also highlighted, we have been mindful of the views that have been expressed about the possibility of practical and other difficulties that might arise from the creation of a new set of constituency boundaries. The debate today has shown clearly that there is a range of views on the extent of the potential problems and even more so—dare I say it?—on their solutions.
	It is also worth reflecting that when the consultation was undertaken, there was no absolutely no mention in any meaningful sense of the idea that a lack of coterminosity—or whatever word we use to describe it—would be an issue. It is only latterly that we have incorporated some of the difficulties or perceived difficulties that might result from a lack of coterminous boundaries. However, I remind hon. Members, particularly my hon. Friends, that in Scottish politics we have operated for a long time, particularly in the local government sphere, with a lack of coterminous boundaries. We have managed to deal with the issues.
	I hope that by bringing forward the timetable to establish an independent body to look in depth at those and related matters, we will allay many of the concerns that were expressed by Members on both sides. I am confident that most of the points made about the potential difficulties of operating within different constituency boundaries can be analysed and solutions found as necessary through the review.
	I shall now cover some of the individual points that have been raised in the debate. I thank all those who have participated, because the debate has been good humoured and robust and much political experience has been brought to bear. I particularly thank my hon. Friends the Members for Paisley, North (Mrs. Adams), for Cunninghame, North (Mr. Wilson), for Clydesdale (Mr. Hood), for Cunninghame, South (Mr. Donohoe), for Strathkelvin and Bearsden (Mr. Lyons), for Cumbernauld and Kilsyth (Rosemary McKenna), for Hamilton, South (Mr. Tynan) and for Glasgow, Anniesland (John Robertson).
	My hon. Friend the Member for Paisley, North is the Chairman of the Scottish Affairs Committee and I know that she played a key role in producing the report with her colleagues. I hope that she will accept that some of the Committee's recommendations will now legitimately be within the domain of the new commission. I trust that that will allay some of the fears that members of the Committee have expressed.
	I welcome the fact that the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (John Thurso) has welcomed the establishment of the commission. I again reiterate the answer to the question about the proportionality of the electoral system.
	We all recognise that the principles of the devolution settlement were laid down by a cross-party consensus in the constitutional convention. Any changes to the electoral system for the Scottish Parliament must reflect those principles and command cross-party and non-party support in Scotland.
	I hope that I can comfort my hon. Friend the Member for Clydesdale because I know that he is concerned about whether the decision about electoral systems and coterminosity will be made by an amorphous, independent review. The decision will be made by this Parliament and not by the commission. This Parliament must ultimately decide what it wants to do about the electoral system and any other recommendations from the commission.

Jimmy Hood: I thank my hon. Friend the Minister for seeking to comfort me. Is she saying that the recommendation will not appear before the House on a one-clause three-line Whip?

Anne McGuire: I must say to my hon. Friend that I am thankful that I am no longer a member of the Whips Office—I was a member for four years. He is experienced enough to know that Government business is Government business is Government business.
	I would like to highlight the touching naivety of the hon. Member for North Tayside. He specifically asked whether we would fight an election on the existing boundaries if one were called for two months' time. Given that we have discussed trying to arrange a postal ballot seven months hence with the electoral returning officers in Scotland, I would be astonished if we could reorganise the boundaries within two months in time for any potential election that the hon. Gentleman may have in his imagination. When he discusses national Parliaments, he should remember that this is a national Parliament—it is the United Kingdom Parliament.

Pete Wishart: Will the Minister give way?

Anne McGuire: No, I must go on.
	I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Cumbernauld and Kilsyth not only on her wholehearted support for the Bill this evening but on her long history of support, activity and campaigning both for the Scottish Parliament and for increased gender recognition in all elected bodies—she is also my Member of Parliament.
	I congratulate the hon. Member for Argyll and Bute (Mr. Reid)—I do not know whether he is in the House at the moment—on working through the morass, as he put it, of local names and constituencies in Argyll and Bute. I must tell him that the naming of constituencies is a matter for the boundary commission and not for the Government.
	I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton, South that we want to continue winning. The debate is not for anoraks; it is about ensuring that we get the best possible government for Scotland. He also said that he was pleased that he was not elected for Central Scotland when he was put on top of the list.
	I appreciate that a number of hon. Members, including some of my hon. Friends, are not yet entirely comfortable with our proposals. However, we are in a period of change and development for our constitution. The Bill marks a small but important step in consolidating progress, and I ask the House to support it.

Question put, That the Bill be now read a Second time:—
	The House divided: Ayes 333, Noes 127.

Question accordingly agreed to.
	Bill read a Second time.

SCOTTISH PARLIAMENT (CONSTITUENCIES) BILL (PROGRAMME)

Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Orders [28 June 2001 and 6 November 2003],
	That the following provisions shall apply to the Scottish Parliament (Constituencies) Bill:
	Committal
	1. The Bill shall be committed to a Committee of the whole House.
	Proceedings
	2. Proceedings in Committee of the whole House, any proceedings on consideration and proceedings on Third Reading shall be completed at one day's sitting.
	3. Proceedings in Committee of the whole House and any proceedings on consideration shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion one hour before the moment of interruption on the day on which those proceedings are commenced.
	4. Proceedings on Third Reading shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion at the moment of interruption on that day.
	Programming Committee
	5. Sessional Order B (programming committees) made on 28th June 2001 shall not apply to proceedings on Third Reading.
	Programming of proceedings
	6. Any other proceedings on the Bill (including any proceedings on consideration of Lords Amendments or on any further messages from the Lords) may be programmed.—[Margaret Moran.]
	The House divided: Ayes 327, Noes 129.

Question accordingly agreed to.
	Committee tomorrow.

EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS BILL (PROGRAMME) (NO.2)

Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Orders [28 June 2001 and 6 November 2003],
	That the programme Order of 14th January 2004 in relation to the Employment Relations Bill be amended by the substitution in paragraph 2 (time for conclusion of proceedings in Standing Committee) for the words '26th February' of the words '2nd March'.—[Margaret Moran.]
	The House divided: Ayes 317, Noes 125.

Question accordingly agreed to.

NORTHERN IRELAND GRAND COMMITTEE

Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 116(1) (Northern Ireland Grand Committee (sittings)),
	That—
	(1) the draft Budget (Northern Ireland) Order 2004 be referred to the Northern Ireland Grand Committee;
	(2) the Committee shall meet at Westminster on Thursday 26th February at half-past Two o'clock; and
	(3) at the sitting—
	(a) the Committee shall take questions under Standing Order No. 110 (Northern Ireland Grand Committee (questions for oral answer)), and shall then consider the instrument referred to it under paragraph (1) above; and
	(b) at the conclusion of these proceedings, a motion for the adjournment of the Committee may be made by a Minister of the Crown, pursuant to paragraph (5) of Standing Order No. 116 (Northern Ireland Grand Committee (sittings)).—[Margaret Moran.]
	Question agreed to.

DELEGATED LEGISLATION

Mr. Deputy Speaker: With the leave of the House, I shall put the Questions on the two motions together.
	Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 118(6) (Standing Committee on Delegated Legislation),

Prevention and Suppression of Terrorism

That the draft Terrorism Act 2000 (Continuance of Part VII) Order 2004, which was laid before this House on 15th January, be approved.

Legal Services Commission

That the draft Criminal Defence Service (Choice in Very High Cost Cases) (Amendment) Regulations 2004, which were laid before this House on 15th January, be approved.—Margaret Moran.]
	Question agreed to.

EUROPEAN COMMUNITY DOCUMENTS

Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 119(9) (European Standing Committees),

Procedures for Granting and Withdrawing Refugee Status

That this House takes note of European Union Document No. 14686/03, amended draft Council Directive on minimum standards on procedures in Member States for granting and withdrawing refugee status; notes that this forms part of the package of measures creating a Common European Asylum System, and supports the Government's position that the Directive should properly take into account the needs of Member States to adapt policies in response to changing situations.—[Margaret Moran.]
	Question agreed to.

DELEGATED LEGISLATION

Ordered,
	That the Greenhouse Gas Emissions Trading Scheme Regulations 2003 (S.I., 2003, No. 3311) be referred to a Standing Committee on Delegated Legislation.—[Margaret Moran.]

PETITION
	 — 
	Horse Riding (Castle Point)

Bob Spink: The horse riding community in Castle Point is up in arms. On Canvey Island alone, there are more than 200 horses, but only one bridleway. Areas of Canvey Island, including the fields of Waterside leisure centre, fields adjacent to Cornelius Vermuyden school and the sea wall near the golf course have been used by horse riders since 1968, but are now increasingly denied to them. That is intolerable. Horse riders are decent people, many of whom are young people doing what they should be doing—getting off the streets to pursue their hobbies—and the council should be supporting them, not hurting them. Therefore, 60 horse riders have compiled a petition in the following terms:
	To the Honourable the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled
	The Humble Petition of Miss Wendy Eydman, Councillor Dorothy Best and others of like disposition
	Sheweth
	That traditional amenities and recreation areas used by horse riders in Castle Point are increasingly being denied to them and that the safety of the riders and horses is put at risk, by barriers and fences often erected to stop motorcyclists or, indeed, the horse riders themselves.
	Wherefore your Petitioners pray that your honourable House shall urge the Government to bring pressure on Castle Point Borough Council to take into account the needs of local horse riders and to promote rather than constrain accessibility to their traditional recreational riding areas and to ensure that, for safety, any new road from Roscommon Way to Haven Road on Canvey Island will include a bridleway.
	And your Petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray.
	To lie upon the Table.

ROTHER DISTRICT COUNCIL

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Margaret Moran.]

Gregory Barker: I am grateful for the opportunity to address hon. Members and highlight yet another blatant example of Labour's covert agenda to underfund local authorities in the south-east to divert taxpayers' money to their heartlands. Sadly, that has become a familiar story throughout our front-line public services in East Sussex. If we examine the funding for the county council, the fire authority, the police authority or even our local hospitals, all tell the same story of fiddled formulae and chronic underfunding.
	My constituents have seen their taxes rise and rise again under the Government, with precious little in return. Tonight, I want to focus especially on the plight of Rother district council. Rother is a responsible and prudent authority, where performance has improved in leaps in bounds since the Conservatives regained majority control five years ago. However, that prudent and fiscally astute authority, which managed to keep its council tax at the lowest rate of any district council in the county and operates efficiently with the lowest employee-to-resident ratio in Sussex, faces the prospect of savage cuts in jobs and front-line services because of the Government's policy systematically to underfund areas such as ours.
	The Minister for Local Government, Regional Governance and Fire has described the average 6.5 per cent. increase that local authorities will receive in grant next year as a good settlement. Indeed, that would be true if it were a 6.5 per cent. rise on a like-for-like basis compared with last year and distributed fairly throughout the country. However, it is not. The Minister also said that the current trend in council tax rises was unsustainable. At least we can agree about that.
	Bexhill and Battle has one of the highest levels of pensioner households in the country. The overwhelming majority depend on fixed incomes and savings, the returns on which have gone down and down in real terms in recent years. For all its relative prosperity, it has pockets of genuine deprivation. Year after year, Government-induced tax rises cripple my constituents, young families and old folks alike. Many people who come to my surgery tell me that, overall, the council tax bill is the largest single item in their household budget, which directly cuts into the amount that they can afford to spend on food and heating. The relentless rise in council tax cannot go on; something has got to give.
	The Minister for Local Government, Regional Governance and Fire has told Rother that he will not hesitate to use the Government's capping powers if the council tax is increased by more than 5 per cent. I shall outline the way in which the abysmal support that the Government have given Rother will mean a dramatic cut in front-line services—that would be the only option if the council were capped. Perhaps when the Under-Secretary replies, he will map out in detail where he believes that the knife should fall. Which services would he like to be axed? How many essential public employees would he like to be thrown on the dole?
	The treasurer of Rother district council has assessed that the increased grant settlement will not go anywhere near repairing the damage that last year's reassessment caused. Last year, Rother lost a massive £1.2 million in Government aid—a huge 10 per cent. of its budget. We could quibble about percentage points here and there, but the figures speak for themselves.
	If we consider the funding for 1994 to 2001, we see that the grant as a percentage of the local budget ranged from 67 per cent. to 63 per cent. Since 2001, that figure has dropped to only 50 per cent.—a massive fall and a massive increase in the amount of council tax as a percentage of the budget. Rother district council has been left in the position of having to recover from the decrease while trying to maintain its essential services for its residents and cope with new demands from Government to take on even more financial responsibilities. Talk of the above-inflation settlement may be borne out by national statistics and UK averages, but specific councils such as Rother have been left much worse off.
	Since 1997–98, the Government grant compared with their assessment of Rother's need to spend through the standard spending assessment formula spending share has fallen from 66 per cent. to below 50 per cent. During that time, the council restricted its increase in spending to less than 4.5 per cent. on average, despite taking on numerous new responsibilities such as a progressive recycling regime, which is expected to cost the taxpayer an additional 10 per cent. per annum.
	Rother is a frugal, well run council that charges the lowest council tax of all the East Sussex boroughs and districts. Only 10 per cent. of the local tax that it collects goes directly to pay for Rother services because 81 per cent. goes straight to the county council and 9 per cent. to Sussex police.
	The recent comprehensive performance assessment inspection highlighted the strong financial control exercised by the council in managing its finances, and awarded the council the maximum score of four. Therefore, it would be wrong to cite poor financial management as a reason for any council tax rise.
	It was estimated last month that without a fairer settlement from central Government, Rother council tax will have to rise by approximately 13 per cent. to maintain current services, and to rise by about 21 per cent. to allow for additional new financial burdens being placed directly on the council by the Government. This year alone, further cash must be found to fund the new Government requirements for liquor licensing, which transfer responsibility for local licensing from magistrates courts to Rother. There are also dramatic increases in the cost of Government inspections, new statutory obligations in respect of local homelessness, and the hefty cost of mandatory participation in the e-government programme, which alone accounts for a 4 per cent. rise in the council tax. I shall deal with each of those items in more detail later.
	The Government's main defence on this issue to date has been to fall back on generalisations and to quote the national increases in Government support, as the Minister for Local Government, Regional Governance and Fire has done in all his correspondence with Rother authorities. It is meaningless, however, in relation to the individual authority level. I hope that when the Minister responds he will present the House with more accurate figures than those deployed by his right hon. Friend, as Rother is one of the district councils that has received the absolute minimum increase in Government support, and not the 5.5 per cent. as his colleague wrongly claimed in his letter to the leader of Rother district council, Councillor Graham Gubby.
	On 10 December last year, the Chancellor announced in his pre-Budget report that a further £340 million would be contributed towards local government support for 2004–05. Even taking into account the Chancellor's much-vaunted increase, for the people of Rother the overall increase amounted to less than £1 per head. Just before Christmas, Rother's director of resources, Dr. Pav Ramewal, was told that Rother would receive just an extra £34,000—an increase of less than 0.5 per cent., taking the overall increase in Government support to a paltry £77,000. Yet in November, when the Government announced their 2004–05 grant figures, they had guaranteed a floor of an increase of 2.2 per cent—£143,000 in Rother's case. With the extra £340 million announced by the Chancellor on 10 December, the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister released a further revised grant settlement and an even higher floor of 3 per cent. Based on this new floor, Rother district council should be entitled to an extra £194,000. Even with the revised increase, however, the actual additional settlement for Rother is just £77,000. That means a shortfall even in the Government's floor of £117,000. On a like for like basis, that represents an increase of 2.9 per cent to be shouldered by the Rother council tax payer.
	As a result of Rother district council's overall unfair treatment in the settlement, Rother residents are staring at an increase of more than 20 per cent. in their council tax bill this year, unless cuts are made in services. Rother's budget has been prepared in line with the council's medium-term strategy of modestly increasing its resource base annually, through moderate phased council tax increases to secure and maintain a prudent and sound financial future. This year's figures, however, have been prepared on a standstill basis. The 2.9 per cent increase on a like for like basis that Rother is receiving takes into account the transfer of benefit funding to the Department for Work and Pensions. The original £34,000 increase, as already mentioned, represents 0.5 per cent. in cash for the council compared with the increase of £143,000 that the council would have rightly expected to see under the floors mechanism. The injustice to Rother in the settlement is plain to see, and the council rightly made representations to the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister. It would appear that a number of district councils across the country have feared a similar outcome.
	Nationally, the Treasury has assumed an average increase in council tax levels for 2004–05 of 7 per cent. but if Rother district council were to spend at the Government's assumed level, it would need to raise nearly £5.5 million locally. That would have a shocking effect on band D council tax charges, pushing them up by 30 per cent. The Government appear to be on a totally different planet. The assumptions do not take into account the impact of the latest raft of obligations, which will force up the council tax.
	The Government are continuing to pile additional costs on to local government, while taking no account of the real costs when it comes to handing out funds for the next year.
	It is clear that the Government's mean and divisive grant settlement has been disappointing to the council and residents of Rother. Until two weeks ago the full implications of the transfer of the housing and council tax benefit subsidy had not been announced, owing to the apparent wrong-footing of the Department for Work and Pensions by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister. Concrete advice and information have been noticeably absent.
	As I have said, Rother is a prudent, financially efficient and cautious council, as is clear from the recent comprehensive performance assessment review and confirmed in this year's district audit letter. Initial budget estimates predicted that the council would lose approximately £150,000 through the transfer of grant to the DWP. Owing to the transitional arrangements announced in the DWP circular, that is now expected to be largely repaid, thereby reducing the council tax by about £4, or 3.4 per cent. However, even that cannot be confirmed until the final 2004–04 subsidy claim is approved by external auditors in 2006. Even if the reduction does eventually occur, the effect of the meagre settlement on the district council's ability to continue to deliver high-quality, affordable service is still potentially very damaging to residents of the district. At the very least, the Government should ensure that they honour the spirit of the floor mechanism agreement, and guarantee a minimum cash increase of £143,000 for the next year.
	On top of that quite dreadful support from the Government there came news in December that East Sussex county council would receive an extraordinary £4,000 from the emergency Government fund to help keep council tax bills down. When that figure was first announced, there was widely thought to have been a mistake with the decimal point in the press release. Sadly, however—rubbing salt into the wounds—it proved to be accurate; but the situation was not replicated across the south-east as a whole. Other counties in the region fared quite well. Kent received an extra £8 million, Essex £7.7 million and Hampshire £7 million. Yet again, East Sussex—inexplicably, for it is the poorest county in the south-east—received next to nothing. Ministers in London seem continually to ignore the plight of cash-strapped young families and many hard-up pensioners in my constituency. To make matters worse, the Government refused to meet a cross-party delegation from East Sussex county council to discuss the minuscule amount it had received to limit council tax rises.
	In his correspondence with our district council, the Minister for Local Government, Regional Governance and Fire also failed to acknowledge the effect of gearing on council taxpayers. If the council's spending next year rises by only about 5 per cent., Rother's council tax will still increase by 9.8 per cent. That is without the imposition of the additional new burdens.
	When the transfer of grant to the DWP is added back, Rother's net budget requirement for 2004–05 has increased by 5.4 per cent., excluding essential growth items. As a matter of necessity the council has frozen all non-salary and contractual budgets for the last three years. That will have an impact on a number of key contracts.
	So why is it necessary for Rother to increase its council tax even further? Once again we return to the new, extra, unfunded demands that the Government are continually making on district councils. First, there is the new licensing regime for liquor. Although the Government intended responsibility for it to be self-financing, finance officers at Rother have done the real sums, and prudently estimate that, at least in the first year, the district council's costs will rise by more than £50,000, or 1.4 per cent. on the council tax bill.
	What else have the Government saddled Rother with? Well, there are inspection costs. No one loves to audit the auditors and inspect the inspectors like new Labour. Over the past few years the council has seen a significant increase in Government inspection costs, particularly those of the Audit Commission, which now amount to more than £150,000 per annum. Until now the council was able to avoid passing all those costs on to the council taxpayer. Unfortunately it now has no alternative but to pass them on, which means increasing the inspection budget by £40,000, or 1 per cent. on the council tax.
	The next point is homelessness. The council has noticed a significant increase in the number of people presenting themselves as homeless over the past two years. Undoubtedly, the change in legislation has accounted for some of the increase, but the real-terms increase is over and above the results of any change in the law and actually reflects the increased cost of housing in what remains a low-wage area. Housing difficulties are on the increase, often exacerbated by people new to the area, and are a real problem, as I regularly see at my surgeries—as, I am sure, does the hon. Member for Hastings and Rye (Mr. Foster) who is in the Chamber—yet the council receives no additional help despite the fact that the cost of bed and breakfast has risen by £58,000 in the last year, an increase of 1.6 per cent. in council tax.
	The Government's drive to modernise and to transfer to e-government is another substantial factor in increased spending. Although the council acknowledges the financial support given by the Government to meet the one-off capital costs of the e-agenda, it comes with a substantial revenue implication for the council. Like many local authorities, Rother is undertaking an extensive programme to replace its legacy of mainframe systems with modern systems capable of delivering services through electronic means.
	I welcome e-government; it gives the public an alternative way to access services but it does not generally replace traditional methods of service delivery. For the time being at least, those extra ongoing costs represent another unfunded burden on local authorities. In 2004–05, an additional £150,000 has been identified to meet the ongoing revenue costs of replacing the council's revenues and benefits system to conform with Government guidelines; that equates to an increase of 4 per cent. in council tax. All other revenue implications of e-government have been funded for efficiency savings. Again, Rother is trying to do its best, in difficult circumstances, to meet Government targets, but as with everything else, that comes at a cost. It must be recognised that Rother is a low-spending efficient council, which is being forced into tax increases primarily due to Government willingness to impose new burdens while refusing to supply the cash to pay for them.
	Inadequate and unfair distribution of Government funding and the imposition of additional unfunded Government requirements is not a defence dreamt up simply by Conservative-controlled councils. As the Minister knows, it was one of the key concerns raised by the Audit Commission in its recent publication, "Council Tax Increases 2003/4—Why were they so high?". Councillors in Rother have called on officers to try to suggest £300,000 of budget savings in a bid to cut the threatened 20 per cent. council tax rise, and are engaged in a highly charged round of public consultation.
	The stark fact is that in the last four years council tax in Rother has risen by 81 per cent. The argument is always made that Rother starts from a low base, and continues to make the lowest charge in East Sussex, but that must be seen in the context that I mapped out earlier. Demographically, we have one of the oldest districts in Britain. It has the highest percentage of residents in the country aged over 85 and the second highest percentage of over-65s, the vast majority of whom are on fixed incomes. Eighty per cent. of the district is an area of outstanding natural beauty and the rural premium means that services cost 30 per cent. more to deliver than in urban areas.
	Any quick analysis of East Sussex authorities demonstrates that the proportionality of funding between council tax and Government support favours the borough—urban—councils. For Rother district council, the grant as a percentage of formula spending share was just under 50 per cent., whereas for the boroughs of Eastbourne and Labour-controlled Hastings, it is more than 60 per cent.
	Both borough councils in East Sussex spend above the Government's assumed need to spend. The Government grant allocation system thus appears to favour the more urban councils and fails to recognise rural issues and the additional cost of delivering services to remote areas. On every count, it appears that the people of Rother are short-changed by the Government, and the council is left with the dilemma of either cutting services or increasing council tax.
	My constituents are angry; many of them are desperate. The problem will not go away and no amount of political gloss or statistical spin will change the hard reality that council tax payers in my constituency face this year: yet another huge hike in their bill or devastating service cuts. I appeal to the Minister in good faith to recognise that we have a real problem. Rother's dilemma may not be unique, but that is of little comfort to those affected, so I ask him to take a short time out from his busy schedule to meet the leader and treasurer of Rother district council at the earliest opportunity, to sit down with them and work through the reality of the pressures that they face, which are not of their own making, and to look again at the chronic lack of Government funding for my area.

Phil Hope: I congratulate the hon. Member for Bexhill and Battle (Gregory Barker) on securing this debate on local government funding for Rother district council. It gives us a useful opportunity to discuss issues relating to this year's local government finance settlement, and to look at the particular circumstances of Rother.
	Let me start by commenting on our decisions relating to the funding of local government revenue expenditure for next year, which were made following full consultation on our proposals. The hon. Gentleman asked whether I would be prepared to meet a delegation from his authority. The Government have not met representatives from any individual councils or local authorities during this year's consultation process, because we are in the second year of a three-year spending round. Last year was the first year in which we changed the formulae throughout, and we took a number of representations from individual councils. However, this year we did meet representatives of the main types of authorities, including those such as Rother district council, through their representation on the Local Government Association.
	Consultation on the draft settlement ended in January, and up to that point many councils had made written representations. However, the hon. Gentleman should know that Rother district council did not make a representation at any stage in the consultation process. As he knows, Parliament approved the local government finance settlement last week, so the consultation and decision-making processes are now complete.
	The 2002 spending review provided very good news for local authorities, with continued increases in grant over the three-year period of the review. Our priority is, of course, education and personal social services. Shire districts such as Rother depend principally on the environmental, protective and cultural services funding. The settlement for 2004–05 provides a cash increase of 3.8 per cent., in terms of spending on those services. Through the settlements made since we took office in 1997, we have been able to increase the amount of government grant given in total to local authorities by £19.1 billion—a 30 per cent. real-terms increase. I should point out to the hon. Gentleman that that compares with the 7 per cent. cut that occurred in the previous four years, under a Conservative Administration.
	So there can be little argument that we have provided greater levels of investment since 1997–98, and there is general agreement that this settlement provides welcome improvements in the money going to local authorities. We have decided to allow local authorities to reduce council tax discount on second homes and long-term empty homes if they wish, which will provide them with additional revenue-raising powers. They will be able to use the money raised through reducing the second homes discount for the benefit of local communities by providing, for example, affordable housing or transport.

Gregory Barker: Surely the Minister does not dispute the fact that the grant, as a percentage of the budget, has fallen dramatically—from 63 per cent. in 2001, to 50.23 per cent. in 2004–05.

Phil Hope: As the hon. Gentleman knows, Rother will receive £5.524 million in general grant in 2004–05—an increase of £202,000, or 3.8 per cent., on a like-for-like basis, compared with 2003–04. That is comparable to the average increase for shire districts of 4 per cent. The new grant distribution system was introduced in 2003–04 following a full-scale review and consultation. The floors and ceilings arrangements that feature in the new system help to provide stability for local government. In 2004–05, Rother will benefit from the protection offered by the floor: it will receive £1.2 million more in grant than it would receive without the support of the floor. In the past seven years, we have been able to provide Rother with an average—I repeat, an average—annual increase in general grant of 4 per cent. There can be no doubt that Rother has benefited from the additional money that we have invested in local government in the past seven years.
	The hon. Gentleman also mentioned the case of East Sussex county council. I have to say that East Sussex is set to receive an increase in formula grants of 4.5 per cent. next year. That is after having received a 5.5 per cent. increase in 2002–03; and a 3.8 per cent. increase in 2003–04.
	I can understand the concerns of the people of Rother, particularly those of pensioners on fixed incomes and others on low incomes, that the settlement will lead the council to impose another large increase in the level of council tax for 2004–05. I have to say to the hon. Gentleman that there is no need for the council to do so. Given the grant increases that Rother district council has received since 1997, which I have just spelled out, residents are right to express dismay at the persistently high levels of council tax increase imposed on them and at the proposed level for the forthcoming year.
	In 2002–03 there was a 20.7 per cent. increase for band D tax in Rother; in 2003–04, a 10.1 per cent. increase; and next year, there will be a reported 9.8 per cent. increase. That is simply unacceptable. Given the Government's significant extra investment in public services and the scope for efficiency improvements, it is unacceptable for local authorities to set large increases in council tax. Local authorities, including Rother, can and should deliver council tax increases in low single figures in 2004–05. We have made it clear that we are prepared to use our powers to cap any excessive council tax increases proposed by local authorities for 2004–05. Let there be no doubt that we will use those powers if we have to.
	I have to tell the hon. Gentleman that we are also keen to ensure that all pensioners entitled to help with their council tax bills are claiming council tax benefit. I hope that we can agree on that. If we have to disagree on the funding issues, surely we can agree about the importance of ensuring that pensioners, particularly those on low incomes and fixed incomes, gain from the council tax benefit facilities that are available. We want to ensure that the 1.9 million pensioners who will gain, or gain more, council tax benefit on the introduction of pension credit get the extra help to which they are entitled. The Department for Work and Pensions is therefore actively pursuing ways of supporting local authorities in their statutory duty to promote council tax benefit take-up.
	The hon. Gentleman has not left me much time to tackle some of the detailed points that he made. He voiced concern about the transfer of responsibility for housing benefit and council tax benefit to the Department for Work and Pensions. However, it was local authorities that pressed the Government to make that change. As a result, the Department for Work and Pensions will implement fairer and simpler benefit subsidy rules from next April, which have been devised in full consultation with the local authority associations. Local authorities have been advised how potential impacts should be assessed and there will be a transitional protection scheme for the first three years. We have listened to local government concerns about the initial proposals and have now decided to limit any losses during the first year of the scheme to 0.5 per cent. I hope that that demonstrates to the hon. Gentleman and the people of Rother that we have listened to some of the concerns and responded actively to them.
	The hon. Gentleman mentioned the Licensing Act 2003, fee levels and the potential burdens that may be created. After a long period of consultation, we have enabled the Local Government Association to build its case and we are grateful for its assistance. When the final fee levels are published shortly, we expect to revise our estimates of the overall income generated.
	The timetable for reform is dictated by the date on which Parliament approves the guidance on the fees, which will be announced by the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, who expects to table the draft guidance for the House's consideration very shortly. The period of transition will commence six months after Parliament approves the guidance and then last for about nine months.
	The hon. Gentleman mentioned inspection costs. We understand his concerns, but I have to say that the comprehensive performance assessment has driven many improvements in local government performance and there is widespread support across local government for the benefits that it brings.
	We know that e-government is bringing about new ways of delivering services. It is bringing cost-efficiency savings into local government and we expect to see that happen. I might add—
	The motion having been made after Ten o'clock, and the debate having continued for half an hour, Mr. Deputy Speaker adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.
	Adjourned at fourteen minutes past Eleven o'clock.